Can creditors sue if the only source of income is Social Security?
My grandmother owes on a lot of freakin credit cards, plus Verizon is on her about returning DVR boxes, that were already returned, but can't find the receipt to prove it. Verizon can kiss my a** as far as I'm concerned, but she has a good $20k piled up on credit card debt. Can credit card companies, if they are successful in trying to sue her, garnish her Social Security? She has no other assets, I swear.
I WANT Bankruptcy to be an option, but her money is just leaking out of her bank account too quickly to save up for a lawyer. Yes, I've tried to open a separate account, but there's already a bankruptcy on my credit report, so I can't open one, and my grandmother can't open a 2nd account because she just foreclosed on a home :\
There's nothing I can do for her financially, except insuring her cell phone gets paid (as well as insurances)
What the f. I mean, really.
Section 207 bars garnishment of your benefits. It can also be used as a defense if your benefits are incorrectly garnished. Our responsibility for protecting benefits against garnishment, assignments and other legal processes usually ends when the beneficiary is paid. However, once paid, benefits continue to be protected under section 207 of Act as long as they are identifiable as Social Security benefits.
This is from the government site. Hope it helps. Write a letter to the credit card companies stating your grandmother has dementia, and only has social security and does not have the income to pay and is judgement proof and also state that they are not allowed to call. (or change her number)
2nd chance checking accounts are not an option. She foreclosed on a house THIS year. That's worse than bankruptcy.
Currently, I am not aware if she owes the government. Also, she gets her social security directly deposited so I do not think I can be appointed a 2nd person on the check, if you know what I mean... Eventually, I will consider this an option JUST in case.
Ah..it's difficult trying to get my legal issues in order, but all this new found paperwork should help.. I'm PoA agent, AND Estate Executor. [Which is even MORE important to figure out this credit mess before hand!] Is the estate expected to pay back credit card bills after the cards have already been charged off (closed out)?
What if the estate doesn't have enough to pay them all? (I think the creditors will be SOL is that happened! Hahahahahha)
First, make certain that all of the credit card debt is unsecured (though it sounds like your grandmother has no property at risk if the foreclosed house was her only asset).
Then, remind yourself that the companies that gave her the credit cards were taking advantage of the craziness in financial de-regulation that allowed companies to essentially make money by extending credit to people who couldn't pay them back. Your grandmother was just a pawn. Not too many years ago, she likely would never have been able to charge up any significant amount. People living solely on a very limited income would not have qualified for credit cards.
If your grandmother has stopped paying on them (if she hasn't, I would), the credit card companies probably have already "sold" the debt to another company (again, more financial shenanigans!). They'll keep sending "offers" to collect less than the amount owed (which, due to fees and interest, is probably many, many times what was actually actually charged on the card). Most won't sue, just threaten. Some may, though. I've accompanied a family member to court over exactly this. They didn't have any money to speak of and needed every penny (and then some) of their SS check just to make ends meet each month. While it's never the best situation to enter a court room without representation, it worked out well for us. There are loads of these companies that buy up debt with often nothing more than a spread sheet print-out to prove they own it. I did a little google research beforehand. The judges seem to be fed up with these cases clogging their courtrooms. The judge in our case lectured the attorney about having no evidence to support that his client was legally entitled to collect on the debt. It never went further than that. The company could have appealed, but instead, a few months later, we received notice that they'd forgiven the debt. Prior to entering the courtroom though, the lawyer asked to meet with us privately. He offered a rock-bottom offer to settle the debt. I had come prepared with a spread sheet showing my relative's income and expenses and told him that there's just nothing there to collect.
It's a smarmy business. The advice I'd give from my experience is, change your grandmother's phone number (they call relentlessly), carefully watch for court summons in the mail (you don't want her to be found in contempt if one of them does sue - that's real stuff), and help her get control of her finances. I now pay all the bills and he's saved about $70 a month in avoiding the bounced check fees alone!
Good luck!
However, there is something to be on the look-out for when it's charged-off:
1099-C aka Cancellation of Debt. This will come from whomever was the original creditor (like Bank of America or Chase or whatever bank group held the credit card) who wrote off or charged-off the debt (and not the collection agency). This gets issued in January and you cannot ignore it. Oh & to make this even more fun, the 1099-C does not have to be issued the year the debt was written off. It could have been debt from years and years ago. So 10K DIscover card charge off could go to 15K with interest & fees and you get a 15K 1099 in reportable income.
What the 1099 -C does is becomes INCOME for the tax year the 1099-C was sent. And this can be sticky to deal with both in that you owe taxes on income and if you get Medicaid, then the "income" (which is really phantom income) can take you over the Medicaid limit for income. What you have to do is file taxes and do an impoverishment for the year against the debt so there are no taxes due. You kinda have to have a CPA or other tax professional do this as it is sticky.
The 1099-C's get routinely done for people who do a foreclosure, or short-sale or walk away from a mortgage. The outstanding $ due on the mortgage but not paid is forgiven as debt BUT the amount becomes taxable income. Imho that was what the intention of the law was - for dealing with foreclosure crisis. But the CC companies can do 1099-C's if they are a bank (so AMEX doesn't do them). If you just ignore the 1099-C, the IRS will get involved as you did not pay taxes or file an impoverishment in excess of the "income".
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