I’ll admit that when I was first served with my summons I was probably just like you: nervous and scared with thoughts of collection agencies freezing my bank account and coming after my paycheck. I, just like you, had enough going on in my life where I really didn’t need this lawsuit. But guess what? I chose to fight them back and I’m here to tell you to do the same thing. It is not hard to beat these unethical companies, trust me. They sue thousands of people a day, and the cases they win are the people who do not answer their summons.

It is really frightening when you are served with any kind of summons whatsoever.

This site has a ton of information to help you defend yourself against collection agencies. All you need to do is look at all the subjects listed on the right hand side of the screen and get reading.

The first thing people say is “Oh my gosh, what am I going to do? I can’t afford a lawyer; I have no money. These guys are going to win this thing”. I am here to tell you that you are wrong.

Just because you’ve been served doesn’t mean you are automatically going to lose your case. As I have mentioned repeatedly, these unethical companies probably do not have the documents to prevail in a court of law and are looking for a default judgment.

The most important thing to do now is to check your summons and read exactly what the court is telling you to do. The court will say you are being sued by certain company for the reasons found on the complaint and that you have a number of days to answer your summons. Depending on the state where you live you could have an automatic court date listed outlining when you should show up to start fighting. If you have a court date listed on that summons, show up for it to avoid a default judgment. If you have, for example, 20 days to answer your complaint, make sure you answer your complaint by the 20th day.

Answering your summons is your first step in defending yourself against a collection agency lawsuit. After you answer your summons it is then the collection agency’s responsibility to further this lawsuit or dismiss it. Collection agencies do not like people who fight their lawsuits back. They want the weak people who do not answer their summons so that they can get their default judgment, freeze their bank account and garnish their wages.

So, the key is to answer your summons right now and begin your fight. Just by answering this company’s summons you will rack up their attorney fees and make them work at winning their case. They don’t want to spend any more money on attorney fees and the attorney’s most certainly do not want to fight you in court. They just want you to ignore your summons so that they can collect this money easily.

Look at your complaint. Isn’t it amazing how, let’s say, a $1,000.00 credit card limit turned into over a $5,000.00 lawsuit. Don’t just ignore this summons and let them collect all those fees.

Remember:

• Force them to show that they actually own this debt and can legally sue you.
• Make them prove it down to the last penny by providing documents that show you owe every single cent they are suing you for.
• Make them prove that you even owe the original creditor any such amount.

The truth is, the collection agency has a lot of work to do in order to provide the necessary documentation to prove their claims.