Just a ploy????

[magyar123]

Statute of limitations here in California are 2 years for verbal agreements, and 4 years for everything else.
My wife, who I married in mid 2003, had huge medical bills from 2000 until January of 2003 - which she never paid as she did not have any medical insurance.
When we recently obtained her credit report it showed all those bills in collections.
But the collection agencies re-aged those debts. They all now show dates beginning in 2004 and later.
So - SOL on these have expired, and legally they can't come after her anymore.
So - is this re-aging just a ploy by creditors/collection agencies to keep an individual's credit rating/history in the toilet??

[HHM]

Short answer, yes.

(note, sometimes specific types of bills have their own statute of limitations, so you need to really check to see what the SOL really is).

Also, there can be some issues about when the SOL actually begins to run (generally speaking, it is not from the date of service, or the date of the bill, but from the date of "official" default). But if the SOL is truly 4 years, odds are, you are probably just outside that by now.

[lrprn]

So - is this re-aging just a ploy by creditors/collection agencies to keep an individual's credit rating/history in the toilet??

See this CA lawyer's website for solid information about collection practices in California - http://www.socaldebtcollectionabuse.com/faqs/ . Scroll down to the FAQs on "What About Credit Reporting Abuses? Do Debt Collectors Commit Credit Reporting Abuses Which Violate the Law? a. Re-aging Debts" and
"Can Debt Collectors Collect Old Debts Which Are Too Old to Sue Upon, i.e. Beyond the Statute of Limitations?" There are some excellent ideas here about what your wife can do to deal with this problem.

[magyar123]

Thanks for your answers. She really is not afraid of any attempts to be sued and any garnishments. She is not working anymore since early 2003 when she became disabled, and since then on SSI. And SSI is exempt from any collection efforts.
My original main issue was that they keep re-aging these debts to keep her credit rating/history in the toilet.

[lrprn]

My original main issue was that they keep re-aging these debts to keep her credit rating/history in the toilet.

Only your wife can decide if it's worth sending the registered letters return receipt to force the creditors or the collectors who bought the original debt to prove they had the right to re-age the debt. No proof? Then they must put the dates back to where they belong. But that won't happen unless your wife forces it to happen. Fair? No. But that's the system that's currently in place.