Statute Barred???

There are posts on this subject elsewhere, but here goes, to the best of my ability:

1)      The collectors can do anything they want. I point out that statute barred cases have been routinely sued; Johnny feels that at worst that's a very rare occurence. In any case it's up to you to find out if your case meets the criteria for being statutorily exempt from prosecution.

2)       If action has been taken against you (wage garnishment etc.) the question is, "Was it barred when the actions were taken?". That's a matter for satisfying your curiosity, really, because if you were successfully sued while your account was technically out of their reach, good luck getting it back on appeal.

There is an outside chance that you could get the judgment set aside and retried, but you'd be very lucky to get a judge to refuse to hear the retrial on limitations grounds. And if the judge tries the case, you'll lose unless you don't owe the money; statute of limitations notwithstanding.

3)      You can ALWAYS repay a debt. It is reactivated as far as the limitations laws are concerned, when you make a payment, however.

There may be a way to make a payment anonymously, stating explicitly that the payment is being made without the consent or knowledge of the alleged debtor and that the payment specifically does not constitute an acknowledgement of the debt and, in fact, specifically denies any liability etc. etc. That might get a payment down without reactivating the limitations period. I doubt that it's ever been tried and in any case, if the payment was ever traced to the original debtor, all the boilerplate in the world wouldn't stand up for a second.

4)       I'm not sure what you mean here, but if you're asking whether they can successfully prosecute a statute barred case, you'll get more than one opinion. I have seen it happen. Often. Johhny doesn't believe that it happens. As to the time factor, it depends on the jurisdiction and whether the action is defended. An undefended action in some jurisdictions could see a judgment signed 2 weeks from the date the case is filed.

Hope the foregoing is helpful.

Johnny, I said a collector CAN do whatever he wants. I didn't say he was ALLOWED to. ( we all know that a collector "can't" tell you that they plan to sue if it's tnot rue. Therefore they never do?)

I was only making the point that the laws are not always or even usually obeyed, so it would be a mistake to expect that a CA is limited in its actions to what is legally permissible.

And as far as the last item is concerned: I was suggesting a hypothetical case in which a payment came in on a debt anonymously. Not one that the alleged debtor openly made "without prejudice". It was admittedly a very strange hypothetical scenario; it was intended to suggest that making a payment would almost certainly reinstate the debt. I was only suggesting that in law NOTHING is absolute and that it was within the realm of possibility that a scenario could be envisioned in which payment was made towards a debt without it affecting the debt's status under a limitations statute. Even then, I suggested that the possibility was far-fetched.

We seem to agree on just about everything else. I agree that a student debt is unlikely to slip past all the checks and balances and end up with a judgment after the limitations period has expired.

BUT. Referring to my previous contention that nothing in law is absolute or guaranteed, I tried to make it clear that it is the responsibility of the alleged debtor to ascertain that the limitations period has indeed expired and that the statute applies in his case. One shouldn't leave it up to the claimant. One shouldn't trust them or their agents for any reason, their dishonesty being equaled only by their incompetence.