I had rented a car back in 2001. I asked my friend to return the car for me, but he wrecked it in the process. They told him that I would receive a bill. Shortly afterwards I was deployed to Iran for 20 months. Came back to find a collections letter for $20,000. Years later I am living in California, and the department has been sent to another collections, and about every 6 months or so I receive the same generic letter saying I need to pay the collection.
About 6 months ago I sent them a validation letter. I sent it certified, however they sent me back a ground mail letter saying that the dept was valid with no accompanying documents.
I can't find the statute of limitations for something like this. Also, should I call Equifax or someone like that and tell them that I want to dispute the collection?
Car renatal wreckage
Hi Daveport,
Car wreckage has Statute of Limitations (SOL). However, the SOL depends on the state where the car had got wrecked.
As for the debt validation, they were unable to validate your debt properly, thus they are not supposed to continue with the collection efforts. What you can do is send them a second validation letter through certified mail, requesting a return receipt.
If they fail to validate the debt this time too, you can send a dispute letter to the credit bureaus. Attach copies of the return receipts of both the validation letters along with the dispute letter to the credit bureaus.
Hope this helps.
Regards,
Aaron