Debt collectors pay to send you SMS messages, around $.003-$.01 it doesn’t sound like alot but trust me it adds up. They pay the same rate for incoming SMS and even more for MMS. So this holiday season, instead of blocking why not sign their numbers up for every spam SMS under the sun?
Happy Holidays!
If you owe money, you are obligated to pay it back. Running away from it will make things worse. What you can do is offer them $1, stating that you can’t afford to pay anything more. They MUST accept an attempted payment (in the US). They will demand more, but if you stick to it, they will accept your payment.
That being said, there are some debts that can be immorally large. Medical debt and college debt are made with imaginary numbers.
However, once you have it, it never goes away.
If I recall, there are instances where this is not good advice as paying anything, even $1, resets time limits and confirms a debt.
I’ve had a incorrect bill sent to a debt collector simply because the fix took longer than the billing system allowed and sent outstanding balances to collections automatically.
Another friend had a zombie debt, one that had been dismissed, pop up again and paying anything would restart the clock.
Then I would say, YMMV. I haven’t had much experience with debt collectors, but in my case, I owed.
This is bad advice and assumes the collection agency is not an absolute piece of shit. Often you can get very low settlements out of the scummy collectors but in my experience many of the debts they harass people over are paid off, settled or otherwise non collectible. “That’s illegal” they really don’t care and will try their hardest to convince you that you still owe them money until you pay or take legal action.