After being served, your Summons will state how many days you have to answer the Complaint. The Complaint should have been attached to the court Summons. The Complaint lists the counts against you and how much the plaintiff is demanding from you should they get their judgment.

The Summons itself tells you that you have [XXX] amount of days to answer the Summons or you will be in default.

• IF IGNORED, you will have to pay every cent on the Complaint, plus attorney costs and you will receive a default judgment.


• IF ANSWERED, you will list your Affirmative Defenses by admitting or denying whichever counts pertain to you.

Along with filing your Summons, you want to file your Notice to Appear.

After filing your Answer, the Junk Debt Buyer will either dismiss the case or send you Discovery. Most dismiss because they don’t have the time nor want to spend the money on someone who they know are fighting them back. This is especially true when they don’t have any documents to back up their claim and most do not.

If they do not dismiss the case, you will then have to answer their entire Discovery plus send out your own Discovery to the plaintiff.

After Discovery, the trial will begin (but most do not get this far unless you do not know what you are doing).