NCO

A slight change in topic but I'm well aware of the notorious NCO. So, I thought I'd share what I know about them and list a few numbers. Now, I advocate taking care of all your other debts...phone bills, electric, medical, etc...because having a wolf on your case like NCO in addition to Sallie Mae...could be just enough to put you into the mental institution.

But here is what I found out about:

NCO has changed their return address...
OLD:
NCO Financial Systems, Inc.
507 Prudential Rd
Horsham, PA 19044-2308

NEW:
NCO Financial Systems Inc
P O box 15630
Dept 99
Wilmington DE 19850

Although on the envelope, it'll just have the PO box info, since by now, they should know having NCO on the envelope would ruin the surprise. What they didn't realize is that the address can be punched into Google. At which point, a simple 'Does not live here at this address' can be written on and NCO will be thrown off for a while. Not a long term solution, but at least it'll save you stress when checking mail. Same goes for medical bill collectors.

The number for which NCO has called from, either from NCO or the name Antoine Jefferson:
1-800-709-8625

There is also a number from an MCO (not sure if its linked) that uses 1-800-708-8625.

The complaints about NCO are long...as well as their practices such as trying to revive "zombie debt", trying to collect off debts of the deceased, lying about bank overdrafts to get routing numbers and all sorts of wonderful tricks to get money. And at times, they go after people who owe nothing at all.

For more stories about NCO, go here.

And again, if you want to avoid a wolf like NCO, just please take control of your finances, pay your bills on time because like Sallie Mae, these guys just aim to make life miserable. And again, I don't advocate not paying debt or running away, I'm just giving out this info because I've had additional debt collectors after me.

I hit gravel on my road bike...a 2 hour wait in the ER, 6 stitches and my bill was over $1000. Luckily, I gave them my Google number (which I highly recommend for these scenarios) which acts as your personal secretary...when a collector calls my Google number, a voice asks for them to ID themselves and the message they leave is immediately put into text and emailed to me. I've avoided the stress of several medical bill collectors trying to use 'unknown caller' status.

I'm gradually paying it off since medical services were rendered and I believe in paying off what I owe...I just don't need or want a collector hounding me on the phone 5 times a day, saying they want the full balance paid off.

So with that, that's why I felt like writing about NCO. So once again, make life a little easier by keeping NCO out of it.

A lesson too late

Bad Credit...it's something they don't teach very well in school, but it's something that many of us will unfortunately encounter. The rules are simple, it's the penalties that are the real complication. Through use of credit, you buy now and pay later. It sounds fantastic, even to little Stephanie Tanner on Full House.
But no one ever went into depth the importance of keeping a good credit score, or even what a credit score was. Had someone in high school told me, aside from college and career, keep your credit rating high, strive for that 720, I would have protected myself much better. I wish more adults had warned me back in the day instead of ignoring the obvious elephant in everyone's living room.
Keep a good credit rating, and you can accomplish that dream of owning a house, or a car, or getting affordable insurance and most of all, never have to hear from a debt collector from NCO or any other cannibalistic debt collector.
And now, jobs and companies, when hiring, are running credit checks. Which, I guess on their side, is somewhat understandable. But to me, here is what I don't quite get.
It's easy to run into bad credit. Take out a Sallie Mae student loan and find out just how easy it is to get into bad credit. But not all people who have bad credit are slackers. They're not all deadbeats, skipping the bills left and right. Many are good honest people who just made bad decisions in life. Now, with companies doing credit checks, the hopes of many who want to slowly crawl out of the pit of bad debt, are being buried under more dirt.
How wrong is that? People want to work off their debt anyway they can, and now, are being denied the one possible job that could get them there.
Or are the companies allied with whoever runs this bad credit scam, keeping millions in debt and jacking up the penalty fees? Seriously, does bad credit help this economy? Or are Sallie Mae, NCO and Visa going to tap dance their fat asses about as the United States of America becomes another Argentina?