To avoid making payments to creditors or debt collectors on accounts that you are not required to, I strongly suggest sending validation of debt letters. These letters require original creditors or third party debt collectors to provide you with accurate and legal proof that you do in fact owe them money. Without sending a validation of debt letter, you run the risk of being part of the abuse that is common in the credit card debt collection industry.
Some consumers will attempt to get validation information from their creditor or third party debt collector over the phone. This never works. For a creditor or debt collector to be legally bound into validating all information on your account, there must be proof of your request for validation in writing. Without written proof it will be easy for the creditor or debt collector to say that they were not notified of the request for validation.
When preparing to send out validation of debt letters, be sure to distinguish between whether you are sending the letter to an original creditor or third party debt collector. Knowing who you are sending the letter to, can help you adjust the letter to your specific situation for better results.
Now that you understand why you need to send validation of debt letters, let me share with you some often missed techniques when deciding what to ask to be validated. You first need to ask for everything that you are legally entitled to know but do not stop there! Feel free to ask for additional information because the worst answer you will get is no answer at all.
After learning about validation of debt letters some over eager consumers go out and whip up what they think will work as a validation of debt letter and send it to their creditor or debt collector. A few weeks later they are often found wondering why they did not get the same results as I have described. The answer is simple, these are fairly complex letters to compose, do not do it on your own if you do not have the proper experience.
Here is one final word of advice when it comes to writing and sending validation of debt letters. Be sure you take into account what stage of the credit card debt collection process you are in when sending your letter because the formatting and composure of the letters can be quite different depending on where you are in the collections process.