Legal Question in Credit and Debt Law in Delaware
Statue of Limitations on Collections
A debt not paid and in default in 1987 has been sold to a different company for collections. The purchaser of this bad debt is now calling and attempting to collect this debt after 17 years.
Is this legal, is there no statute of limitations?
1 Answer from Attorneys
Re: Statue of Limitations on Collections
The statute of limitations is a bar to a lawsuit, or a defense if suit is filed. It's not a removal of a debt. The debt remains.
The holder of the paper can ask that you pay the debt, or even demand that you pay the debt. What they can't do is threaten you with a lawsuit, or file a lawsuit, since that would be a clear-cut violation of the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act.
The other thing they can't do, seven years after the debt was initially incurred, is file the debt with a credit reporting agency with a later date. That's a violation of the federal Fair Credit Reporting Act.
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