Can you be sued for "owing" 80 dollars?
My mother use to sell products for a certain company whose name I will not mention she decided to stop and returned their products to them. She dropped their products off at the companies office and the reps even saw her do it and told her it was okay she would not owe them anything. After a few months the company started calling her saying she owed them money because she never returned the products, she told them she would not pay them a cent. Now they are having a collection agency call her and telling her that she should get a lawyer. This collection agency calls everyday. I have been reading on the internet that this company has done this to many people and has the same agency call people saying they will be sued. Both of these companies are legit. My mother returned all the products in mint condition, they weren't even opened yet. Can she be sued or forced to pay if the company still claims that she didn't return them?
Answers:
A person can be sued for any amount and unless she can go back to wherever she dropped off the materials and and get that person to sign and affidavit indicating such, she may end up having to pay for the items.
For $80, it will only go to Small Claims Court and she will not need a lawyer. There is no jury, just a Judge and it is a rather informal setting where the Plaintiff has to present their case and the Defendant disputes the case and hands over any evidence to the Judge.
The burden of proof by the preponderance of the evidence will have to be met by the collection agency in order to win the case.
One thing in her favor may be lack of due diligence on the part of the company in attempting to collect the on the outstanding items. If they didn't continually bill her every month for the items there would have been no way for her to know that the company didn't have record of her turning the items back in so she wouldn't be billed. Another thing will be to print off anything you can find of the internet showing that the company has a history of pulling the same thing with others (even better if she can dig of names and get notarized affidavits of others that have had the exact same problem with both the company and the collection agency).
As for the collection company, they will use any scare tactic as almost all collectors in a collection agency work on some sort of percentage based income from what they collect.
To get them off her back, under Fair Debt Collections laws, she needs to send them a letter disputing the debt and that they are not to call her anymore and any communication needs to be sent to her in writing. Here is the law regarding communications under 15 USC 1692c, ยง 805.(c):
" CEASING COMMUNICATION. If a consumer notifies a debt collector in writing that the consumer refuses to pay a debt or that the consumer wishes the debt collector to cease further communication with the consumer, the debt collector shall not communicate further with the consumer with respect to such debt, except --
(1) to advise the consumer that the debt collector's further efforts are being terminated;
(2) to notify the consumer that the debt collector or creditor may invoke specified remedies which are ordinarily invoked by such debt collector or creditor; or
(3) where applicable, to notify the consumer that the debt collector or creditor intends to invoke a specified remedy.
If such notice from the consumer is made by mail, notification shall be complete upon receipt."
It is possible but in my opinion if possible it's ridiculous is would cost the company more than the little $80, because they would have to pay for a lawyer.
Anyone can sue anyone else for anything. The claim doesn't have to be true in order to file the suit. Instead, one side claims it is true in a complaint. The other side claims it is not true in an answer. Eventually there is a trial and either the judge or jury decides what is true. So, yes she can be sued. It is unlikely. She ought to send the collection agency written notice that she contests the debt, and letting them know that she suspects that they are acting in "bad faith" by trying to collect a debt when they have no reason to believe the debt exists, and demanding that they cease immediately. Sometimes that works. The words "bad faith" are important. They are a shot across the bow indicating that if she has to defend a suit, she will counterclaim but against the collection agency itself, not just the client company.
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