Legal Question in Credit and Debt Law in Missouri

Statute of limitations being ''reset'' for charged off account

I have a credit card debt which has been charged off. (I believe the orginal debt was incurred in 1996 with no payments being made on the account after a year or so). The account was sold to another collection company, and they have been bugging me for payments, so I have made some $50 payments here and there over the course of the past few months. I never receive statements or anything from this company, so a couple of months ago I stopped making payments. I just learned that the debt was possibly beyond the statute of limitations prior to making the sporatic payments of late, but by making the payments, the collection clock could have been restarted. I live in Missouri, and the statute of limitations is 5 years. Can you tell me if by making payments after the charge off, I reset the collection clock.


Asked on 2/27/04, 11:58 am

1 Answer from Attorneys
Anthony DeWitt Bartimus, Frickleton Robertson & Gorny, PC

Re: Statute of limitations being ''reset'' for charged off account

If you had a written contract with the credit card issuer the statute of limitations is ten years on a written contract. See section 516.110, RSMo. Also the statute starts to run when the last payment was missed, so most likely, the statute does not start to run against the credit card company until they made a demand for payment in full. So it would appear ten years from 1997 or so would be your statute of limitations date.

Your account was sold to a purchaser of distressed loans. This purchaser more likely than not paid very little for your loan and is "speculating" that through agressive collection techniques that he can get you to pay.

You may be able to work out a deal to pay less than you owe if you negotiate with the collection company.

Your best bet it to work out a payment plan with the creditor. You might try a consumer counseling service.

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Answered on 2/27/04, 1:14 pm


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