Why Seniors Shouldn’t Worry about Debt Collectors

hi i'm jeff hoyt editor-in-chief of seniorliving.org if you don't pay your bills you could hear from a debt collector but today you're going to hear from attorney eric olsen who's going to tell us why seniors shouldn't have to worry about debt collectors now eric is an expert on this topic as he's the founder of the helps non-profit law firm which serves senior citizens veterans and disabled persons struggling with debt based on his vast experience and knowledge eric will reveal the laws that debt collectors must follow how to make them prove that the debt is real how to get him to stop calling why sending them even one dollar can be a bad idea why you shouldn't worry about getting sued and how his law firm can help as eric is in salem oregon and i'm in los angeles we'll be conducting the interview online via zoom [Music] hi it's jeff hoyt editor-in-chief of seniorliving.org and once again it's my pleasure to be speaking with attorney eric olsen eric is the uh founder and executive director of the helps non-profit law firm that helps seniors and other people struggling with debt hi eric how are you really good jeff really good good to hear so people are struggling with debt and they don't pay off their debts eventually they may be contacted by a debt collector so i want to talk to you about that but first off is debt really that big an issue with american seniors today absolutely um statistically almost half of seniors have incomes within 200 percent of the poverty line and uh they end up they owe more debt than ever before uh the this 200 percent of classic fight is economically vulnerable uh yeah it is a big problem and it's getting bigger all the time so if a senior does have consumer debt credit card debt uh medical debt uh auto loan they don't pay off what what happens um when they don't pay their debt well if they don't pay their debt first off that's going to happen is uh the original creditor is going to call them like the credit card company's going to call them um you know maybe the doctor office will call them and if they can't pay it or they're late and pay or eventually they're going to turn it over to a debt collector a collection agency that's going to collect on behalf of the original creditor and are there rules that this debt collector is supposed to follow uh there are there's a lot of rules that debt collectors are supposed to follow in trying to collect a debt such as what time of day they can call who they contact yeah okay um yeah there's there's it's called the fair debt collection practices act uh is governs what debt collectors can do and what they can't do in trying to collect a debt um they can't harass or they can't abuse when they make calls they can't make they can't lie they can't make false misrepresentations they can't call before 8 a.m or after 9 p.m um there's certain restrictions on days they can call and sundays they can't communicate um there's but you know it kind of depends on who the debt collector is you've got all kinds of debt collector you've got debt collectors for payday loans you've got debt collectors for uh high interest loan outfits then you have debt collectors for doctor bills and you have debt collectors for um credit cards so there's they're not all the same and some of them are a lot more aggressive than other ones i think one thing uh seniors can count on a debt collector will never tell a senior about their rights which is very important for seniors to know and how is it different when a senior owes debt as opposed to a younger person good question and it's really the key to this you know when we're younger and we have a job and if we owe debt we're worried that we could get sued and someone could garnish our wages okay and that can be scary for a person that's uh you know employed has a family or whatever but the laws and the rules completely change when a senior retires when they're starting to get social security a pension if they're getting disability if they're getting va benefits it's not the same they're not in the same world when it comes to debt collectors it's completely different so if i get a call about a debt um how do i know it's real how do i know i'm paying off the right person is there a way to get the debt verified so jeff the rules for seniors the laws for seniors are completely different and a lot of seniors don't know that and that's the most important thing they need to understand and i'll explain that seniors need to understand that their retirement income their social security their pension their disability their va benefits is protected by federal and state laws it can't be garnished or taken from them okay whereas if they had wages when they were younger it could be garner they could have something to fear about but when they're older and they're on this protected income a debt collector if they were to sued whatever they can't take the money from them so in a lot of ways seniors don't have to feel fear debt collectors if they call they don't have to fear them because uh it's kind of like a hollow remedy for a debt collector but now a debt collector will never tell a senior this that their income is protected or their rights they just won't they're the debt collectors whoever they are you know most of them are paid on a commission basis and those they kind of they're aggressive they bend the law sometimes to even though the law dictates what they can do a lot of them stretch it there was an article in time magazine a few years ago and i'll never forget it you know debt collector talked about how often they're sued under the fair debt collection practices act for violating the law and the guy was honest he said well you know yeah we do it all the time um because it's effective and if we lose a lawsuit and have to pay a little bit of money it's just a cost of doing business and so the amount that a person they could be hurt is hasn't really changed over the years so a lot of them you know some of them are can engage in tactics that coin aren't legal but the senior needs to know their income is protected and they don't need to talk to a collector if they don't want them they know they'll need to pick up the phone they don't need to talk to them but if they do talk to them there are rules that apply so there are rules the law that apply to the debt collectors and some of them are more aggressive than others like you said but what about the person who owes the money it's like are there certain things they should never do when dealing with a debt collector there's a statute of limitations okay so if if i have a credit card debt and i stop paying it um the creditor legally has a certain amount of time to collect on that debt or file a lawsuit to collect on that debt um often and it depends on the state commonly it could be six years it might be four years sometimes it's even less they have to take a lawsuit to establish that you owe the debt within that period of time but most of the time in most states if you make a payment towards that debt it it sets the clock up for like if you pay it it's a six year statute of limitations you pay it and you make a payment and there's only a year left then boy the collector has another six years to try to collect on the debt so yeah you need to be careful if a statute of limitations is going to run you know whether you should make a payment or not you you've got to realize that when you talk to a debt collector that they can be pretty aggressive you can cut off the communication uh and then if you don't want to get the communication anymore the the fair debt collection practices act provides it you can send a letter to that debt collector and it's called a cease and desist letter which tells the debt collector that you don't want them to communicate you don't want them to communicate with you anymore by phone or mail okay and you can send that you can send it by regular mail you can send it by certified mail or both and debt collectors legitimate debt collectors know when they get a cease and desist letter they can't call you anymore and they cannot send you a demand letter they have to leave you alone now they could sue you but that's usually no big deal because your income is safe but you can stop the debt collector in their tracks by sending them a cease and desist letter but um once again if you insist on talking to them you have to realize that uh you know there's certain things a debt collector has to has to you know has to comply with for example if you got a a debt collector called you and you didn't know who it was about they have to identify who they are and what the debt is and and you can write them a letter and they have 30 days to tell you where the debt came from who the original creditor is and give you the complete information and during that 30 days under the law they're supposed to stop collection action during that 30 days so you can ask them for uh proof that you owe the debt and where it came from a lot of a lot of times seniors get calls from people and they don't have the finished idea what the debt is about you have a right to ask for it once again uh seniors should know that there's a lot of scam collectors out there okay they i don't know where they get this but they find out that someone might be susceptible to intimidation okay and so maybe they sell these names and get people calling maybe they they know about a debt you had years ago and then they'll call you about it and they try to intimidate seniors um the seniors should know that their income is protected they don't need to talk to this person they can hang up the phone i hope that covers on that part great so to be clear anyone of any age can get sued it's just that someone's not going to take the time and effort and money to file a lawsuit against a senior if they know they don't have any other income except for their income that's protected their social security their pensions and whatnot yeah yes and no okay um there's a lot of i mean if you if a senior had like 10 credit cards okay let's say for 10 different companies maybe 1.5 or maybe 1.5 out of the 10 might file a lawsuit okay us there are some debt collectors some credit card companies more likely sue than others um and a lot of times i think they sue just to it's scary to get a lawsuit and it can be intimidating if the debtor doesn't know their income's protected or that it's safe they might be you know they might choose to pay the debt because they don't think they have any other choice they don't realize that nothing can be taken from them so no they still can be stood but it's a lot of debt collectors i think realize that if they sue a senior they're not going to get anything so a senior might be less likely to be sued than a person who has a job that's younger thanks for clarifying that so a senior who gets a call from a debt collector certainly has the right to say hey put it in writing let me know who i owe whatever they should admit nothing on the phone but they can certainly ask for the information correct they can ask for it they have to they have to make that request in writing okay and send it to them and get the address and send it to them they can send it by regular mail or certified mail or both and the collector has 30 days to get him that information right and a legitimate collector would give this address over the phone in other words i wouldn't know if i got a call from someone what their address is unless they tell it to me good question yeah um i talk to a lot of people and who talk to debt collectors who won't identify who they are i think they just call to try to shake someone down intimidate and scare them to pay something when they're really not legitimate and are there requests for being paid in bitcoin or itunes gift cards or things like that from illegitimate debt collectors as well you know i haven't heard that happening but it does happen but no i don't see that happening with seniors there are seniors that dick take advantage of uh are scammed for different things but that's not debt collectors that are doing those those are scammers um yeah i was referring to like a scam debt collector but if the debt is legit you can ask them to give give their address you'd write them a letter saying how much do i owe who do i owe a two and they would have 30 days to respond yeah they have to validate the debt they have yeah they have to validate it say who they got it from and uh who the money was originally owed to they have to give you the information so you know if you legitimately owe that bill and then if your income is protected as a senior you can decide hey i'm not gonna bother responding and they can sue you but you said you know it could happen but the odds are low it depends who the creditor is yeah it depends but once again even if you're sued uh that's no big deal they can't collect any they can't touch your social security they can't touch your pension as we've talked before on this channel seniors income in their bank account from federal sources is protected automatically by banks up to twice the amount of your federal benefit you receive each month is protected automatically from garnishment so yeah seniors don't don't need to worry and they're unlikely to be sued if they are there normally there wouldn't be any issues that would cause them any problems but it can't be scary it can't be scary that's true and so if they do get the the debt validated they can decide to pay it or if they decide not to pay it and they keep getting bothered with phone calls they can send this cease and desist letter to say don't contact me anymore or they can do that at the beginning if they want and where can seniors get a copy of a cease and desist letter they can just google cease and desist letter on the internet and they'll probably come up innumerable templates we've got some on our website uh but um it's there's a lot of if they search on the internet though we easily find a copy a template of a uh of a seats and assist letter they can send right and there's one on the helps website as well oh yeah yeah we got one and we give to people if they like it yeah you bet and how else can that that helps non-profit law firm help people who are struggling with debt who are being hounded by debt collectors okay um so what helps is uh we're a 501c charity non-profit law firm we help seniors in all 50 states nationwide we protect seniors from debt collector harassment under the this federal law that we talked about this fair debt collection practices act one of the provisions is if someone's represented by an attorney debt collectors can no longer call or send letters to that person anymore and so what helps does is people contact us the enrollment helps we send a cease and desist letter to the people they owe money to tell them to leave them alone and then we represent the seniors or disabled person ongoing so they have an attorney literally forever so they never have to deal with debt collectors again and so if they ever have a question or concern or worry they can always pick up the phone and call us if they got a new debt collection demand letter or call they they would if they got a call they'd refer them to help say hey contact my attorney help so you can no longer legally contact me and then you hang up the phone and then you give us who the new contact was we'll send them a cease and desist letter and they'll leave them alone but the most important thing that i guess i think that we do is that we protect the seniors ongoing and then we also educate the seniors on how they can maintain their financial independence what they can do so that they can live within their means and how they can protect protect themselves so they don't have to worry about the collectors but also have enough money to provide for their basic needs great and you mentioned the cease and desist letters also available on your website uh what is the website and how can people contact helps um well we're all the internet it's www.helps is here.org h-e-l-p-s-i-s-h-e-r-e dot o-r-g um or they can just type in helps non-profit law firm now help has an s on it and stands for help eliminate legal problems for seniors helps um and yeah they can call us on the phone with questions it's toll free 855 helps us or helps us either one will get to us well i really appreciate you taking the time and hopefully this uh helps a few seniors who are struggling with debt and how they can combat these debt collectors i do too i think just the most important thing i've seen you need to realize is that their income is safe and protected and that a debt collector really can't really do anything to them they can scare and intimidate them and then they don't need to communicate with them if they don't want to great thanks for taking the time eric you bet jeff you

Channel: SeniorLiving.Org

Views: 60,649

Keywords: seniors debt collectors, social security, debt collectors, debt, social security benefits, social security retirement, social security at 62, seniors, senior living, senior finance, bank account, senior bank account, pension, protect pension, bank account protection, va benefits, debt collections, debt collectors call, stop debt collector calls, stop debt collectors, senior citizen, Eric Olsen, HELPS Nonprofit Law Firm, debt collector harassment, seniors and debt collectors

Id: b7Xg5O0dJAY

Length: 18min 18sec (1098 seconds)

Published: Wed Mar 17 2021