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Berengiere
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Joined: 19/April/2005
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Topic: Three part loan? Posted: 19/April/2005 at 11:15am |
Here's the situation I'm in. I went to community college (and got the student loans in Ontario) and graduated
in December 1995. I filed for deferrals for paying back the student
loans because I was starting up a new business immediately after graduating and didn't have the
money to make the rather large payments they wanted.
When Scotiabank moved their studen loans to a single, centralized
location, they lost my paperwork. I spent the next two years being
bounced back and forth between Scotiabank and other agencies, trying to
find out what I was supposed to do.
In early 1999, I moved to the US and got a married. In July 1999, I
was contacted by credit agencies about the Canada and Ontario student
loans, and my husband and I paid those off.
Now, on Tuesday of last week, I got a phone call from someone claiming
to be calling on behalf of Scotiabank, saying I still owed money, with
some story about the unsecured portion of the student loans. They
amount he claims I owe is less than $5000, if you include the "fees and
interest".
Is this legit? I don't ever remember reading anything on the
consolidation papers about there being an unsecured portion of the
loan.
The guy called again today and said, when I mentioned the Fair
Collections Act (because my husband wants him to supply proof that I
do, indeed, owe the money), that it doesn't apply to him because it's a
Canadian
debt, despite the fact I'm a legal US resident (got my green card and
everything).
All that being said, the reading I've done says that they do indeed
have to follow the Fair Collections act, but I'm unsure of what's going
on with the time frame. Do they have a leg to stand on?
It's been 8 years since the loss of paperwork put me into default, and
8 years since the first two collection agencies tracked me down and I
paid them in full.
What should I do? I've already looked through all my financial
papers and couldn't find my copies of the consolidation papers. I
suspect they were in the box of documents that got destroyed when there
was a flood in my parents' basement.
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Berengiere
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Joined: 19/April/2005
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Posted: 19/April/2005 at 11:16am |
Ack. Make that 6 years since the collection agencies first called me.
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polyhymnia61
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Joined: 10/January/2003
Location: Netherlands
Points: 915
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Posted: 19/April/2005 at 8:20pm |
Odds are, your loan WAS split into three.
You went to school the same time I did, and I was surprised like you after Metropolitan Collections approved me to make payments into their CURE program for $400 a month. I thought I was finally making decent payments for the federal portion and rehabilitating the loan after I was thrown into collections for much the same reason as you.
Soon after I made that agreement, I received this "Final Notice From the Crown." Apparently, I was only making payments on $15,000 worth of my $45,000 Federal loan and they wanted full payment on the rest yesterday.
Are we told that upon graduation? NO. Does the NSLC tell us that our loans will be split into Crown and bank risk before being thrown into two collection agencies to be harassed twice as much? NO.
Advice? Beyond contacting Johnny at CWG (see the main page), I don't know because I did everything wrong in response (by taking the advice of the so-called "experts.")
Good luck,
Poly
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Home is where you are allowed to prosper.
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Berengiere
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Posted: 20/April/2005 at 7:40am |
Lucikly, our money situation is such that if we need to, we can pay it
off in a lump sum - if they can prove to our satisfaction I do indeed
owe the money. It'll mean we can't do the full repair of our
disintegrating 40+ year old kitchen, but we can do it.
What's really bugging my husband and I is that it's taken them almost 8
years to track me down and start asking for the money, six years longer
than it took the two different agencies for the government secured
portions. It's not like I've been hiding or anything. Heck,
I didn't even change my name when I got married.
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Berengiere
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Posted: 20/April/2005 at 7:44am |
Oh yeah. I called the NSLC about it, trying to find some help,
and the guy I spoke to said he couldn't help me; that the laws had
changed twice since my student loans were consolidated and it was my
responsibility to get all the information and deal with it.
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polyhymnia61
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Joined: 10/January/2003
Location: Netherlands
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Posted: 21/April/2005 at 2:53am |
Call Johnny, Berengiere. I'm sure this is something that can be cleared up simply.
Poly
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Home is where you are allowed to prosper.
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Berengiere
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Posted: 23/April/2005 at 6:33am |
And the saga continues. At 9:06 this morning, I get an "out of
area" phone call from a guy who says his name is Brij, asking me what
the problem I'm having with his collections agent is. I tell him
there is no problem, and that I'm waiting for him to send me the proof
I owe the money.
To make a long story short, he got rude and abusive with me on the
phone. I told him that from now on, I wanted all communication
from him to me to be in writing. He immediately accused me of
trying to take the easy way out. I said no, that it was on the
advice of a lawyer I wanted all of this in writing. He imediately
started getting more obnoxious and yelling and trying to talk over me,
saying he didn't care about my lawyer and I hung up. I didn't
want to be subjected to hs yelling and attempted bullying. Ten
seconds later, as I'm writing up an email to CFW, there's another call,
this time it's registering as an Ontario call and shows a phone
number. We didn't answer it.
My husband and I are wondering why he objected so much to my wanting
everything in writing. I mean if it was legit, why object to
everything being in writing? The other credit agencies I've dealt
with had no problems putting everything in writing for me.
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SolveStudentDebt
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Joined: 05/November/2003
Location: Canada
Points: 5996
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Posted: 24/April/2005 at 10:50am |
The collector does not make any money unless money is collected. Sending you paperwork and such does not earn them any money. it just prolongs things, and in this process it depreciates their grip on the issue at hand.
Collectors are trianed to overocme objections and not lewt anything obstruct their way to geting you to pay the debt. If they give in to your request for information then they have lost the battle to instill fear and urgency.
Call me tomorrow (Monday) and I will help you out (866-239-7887).
Johnny
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