Legal Question in Credit and Debt Law in Louisiana

Re: Medical Debts regarding collection agencies

As far as I know, there is no law or rule that prevents or restricts a hospital (or any other business or individual) from turning an unpaid account over to a collection agency--even if the debtor is already making payments. You must understand that the hospital wants to be paid the entire amount as quickly as possible. This is comparable to you working a full-time job for 2 straight weeks and then being told by your boss that he will pay you your 2 weeks' wages a little at a time each month over the next few months. I do not think that you would be happy or content to let him pay you a little bit of the money owed to you each month over several months. You would probably go as fast as possible and get a lawyer and/or sue the boss to be paid ALL of your money at one time plus whatever interest and damages you could get for his refusal to pay on time. Similarly, the hospital, which has rendered treatment and services to you expecting to be paid for it, is not required to wait or accept payment terms from you--they are probably legally entitled to be paid the full amount of their bill and without delay. Their acceptance of your payments up to now probably does nothing to prevent them from turning your account over to a collection agency and/or filing suit against you--for the bill, legal interest, attorney's fees and court costs.

If you're worried about being sued, etc., I would suggest that you contact the hospital and/or the collection agency immediately and offer to sign some kind of repayment agreement with them if they will agree to postpone any legal action as long as your payments are timely. That should "lock" you into payment terms and prevent them from suing you AS LONG AS YOU MAKE THE PROMISED PAYMENTS ON TIME.