Recent experience with a collection agency

I'm going to post an experience I've had recently with a collection agency in the hopes that it will help someone else avoid this in the future.

Recently, my husband was hospitalized and we were presented with a sizable medical bill. We were able to pay most of it, but a portion was turned over to a collection agency. I contacted the agency and asked if we could make payments. They said that yes, we could, but offered a lower amount if we were able to settle immediately. They explained that it wouldn't affect my credit the way a credit card settlement would. We accepted the offer and they sent a small slip of paper with the required amount and the words "Submit with Payment" written on it. We sent the paper and the payment back in.

I KNEW I should have made a copy of that paper before sending it in, but I'm way too trusting.

Anyway, last week, I receive a bill from a DIFFERENT collection agency for the difference in the amount of the settlement. I called the first agency, but they at first claimed to know nothing of the settlement offer, then claimed that I didn't send the settlement in time (NOT true) so it was withdrawn, and then when I asked how they knew that information when they supposedly had no record of the settlement, they hung up on me. They've hung up on me every time I've tried to call since.

SO, I called back the agency who was now handling the debt. The agent I spoke to was actually very nice (refreshing) and told me that what he believed had happened was that the first agency offered a "fake" settlement just hoping to get some money out of us and then sold the remainder of the debt to the second agency. And the reason they sent just that small piece of paper to be submitted with the payment was that they were counting on the fact that I wouldn't make a copy for proof. Without proof, there was nothing he could do for me, so I had to pay the balance and he promised to report my now paid account status to the credit bureaus immediately. However, the damage has been done to my credit score. Without proof of the paid settlement, I cannot have it taken off my credit report. I've reported them to the better business bureau (surprise, surprise, they have a negative record with the BBB for non-compliance and non-response), but that will do no good.

The moral of this story is, get EVERYTHING in writing, take names, dates and tape conversations if possible, make back up copies of every document and keep them in a safe place, and investigate every agency you deal with whenever possible, especially in a settlement situation. A lot of work, and it's a shame that you have to do these people's jobs for them, but seemingly necessary.

Good luck.

Kim