Please help me

The good news, if there is any, is that you are being sued. Which
means that you can stand in front of a judge (with the help of your
lawyer) and say that you want to pay what you owe, but cannot do it
all at once.

If you're sincere, chances are that the judge will support the idea of
a payment plan. Sounds like that's what you want/need.

Keep in mind that it's not the best interest of anyone for the
collection agency to cause you to be homeless. If they have a way to
collect all of the money, even over time, that's better than what
they'll get almost any other way.

However, it may never get to court, because, frankly, the collection
agency doesn't want that. Unless this is a very significant amount,
it'll cost them more to go to court than it's worth. As court date
comes closer, they'll be more willing to discuss other options.

In the meantime, call a non-profit credit counseling group, provide
them with the information they ask. In doing so, if this goes to
court, you can at least show that you're really trying to do the right
thing. Plus, the group may actually be able to assist you in working
with the collection agency in a way that avoids court.

At this point, AMEX may have sold the debt, and therefore has no
ability to do anything for you.

unfortunately since they've gone to the collection agency most likely
you'll have to pay the collection agent and not Amex.

either way, the bill should be the same, with the addition of possible
late fees

i would suggest calling the collection agency and working out a
payment plan.

and since it was brought up on another site, i'll give you the link to
the laws on collections

http://tinyurl.com/m2ob62
link will take you to a PDF file, but the "HTML" version of it.

it's long and boring, but it has a lot of info

You will not lose anything,
Collection agencies cannot take anything. They might get a defaukt
judgement, but have no power to get your house, car, underwear,
nothing.Maybe a wage garnishment, but would not worry yet.

If you play with the snakes, you will eventually get bit.


Good Day

That website that I sent you also has information on how to answer
that summons for the collection agency that is trying to sue you. Make
sure you send your answer to the court in time. My friend had this
happen to her and I helped her draft her answer. The collection
agencys often summon people to court in hopes that they don't show so
they can get a default judgment against them. The fact is that they
really don't have the documentation to win against you in court so if
you send in your answer making it so that they don't get a default
judgment for you not showing up they often drop the case. The
collection agency likely has no supporting documentation that this
account was even yours as they usually buy these accounts from places
like AMEX for pennies on the dollar. If they can't provide any of that
info they lose. In the case of my friend as soon as we sent in the
answer to the summons they dropped they case as they had nothing to
support it. Do your research before you offer to pay anyone anything!

Don't worry. A collection agency can't take anything from you. They
often use threats to collect from customers but they can't take
anything that you own. Credit card debt is unsecured which means that
when they took the risk of giving you a card there was no collateral
for it. This website has a ton of useful information on how to handle
creditors and what the laws are. Visit the forums there is a lot of
information in there and a lot of knowlegable people there.
http://tinyurl.com/r6gsnv