Posted on 10/08/2014 2:24:45 PM PDT by redreno
LACEY, Wash. -- A family is outraged that their $30 bounced check for school lunches has exploded into an $800 charge.
A giant lunch bill has left a bad taste with Dr. Christina Johnson-Conley. Her two children attend North Thurston High School in Lacey and eat lunch there every day. But last year the family bounced a $30 lunch payment check. They just found out that their wages were garnished nearly $800.
"I support our school district, but not in this way," said Johnson-Conley.
The North thurston school district said it had no choice but to do everything to collect the money.
"I can't account for fairness," said district spokesperson Courtney Schrieve. "But we do due diligence as a public entity to get her to pay and she chose not to, so after that we're accountable to the taxpayers and we can't incur debt for people."
The district said they sent two letters over a 7-month period trying to collect the $30. The district said the letters went unanswered, so the bill was sent to collections.
"We call 12 to 15 times," said Llora Olson of Grimm Collections of Tumwater. "We send statements to you. If we call and you hang up, you leave us no choice but to proceed with a remedy so we can collect for our client."
(Excerpt) Read more at komonews.com ...
lol.. there's a belly buster
they probably spent $2,000 trying to collect.
Who’s connected cousin owns the debt collection agency? And did they agency keep $15 of the $30 as is sometimes the case???
2 thoughts
IF as they say they made numerous efforts to collect then I wonder why the family didn’t pay
BUT 2. many school districts are letting EVERYONE eat free and the taxpayer pays
too bad this wasn’t one of the districts that do that
I though schools just refused to hand over report cards at the end of the year, unless all debts were paid?
They didn’t try to pay the $30 so now they have cough up $800.
All this could have been avoided had they tried to work out a payment plan with their creditor.
Its an expensive lesson in the wages of not redressing a bounced check.
re: “We call 12 to 15 times,” said Llora Olson of Grimm Collections of Tumwater.
I can easily see this happening. I don’t answer phone calls from people I don’t know either. 99% of the time it is somebody calling trying to sell me something, get me to contribute to something, or even worse, a scam.
insanity
Used to be it was criminal to write a bad check. All the holder of a bad check had to do is go to the cops and file a complaint. Then the check writer gets a ride to the old GrayBar.
Yes, the final amount is excessive but as a small business owner I have zero sympathy for people who bounce checks and then don’t make things right as quickly as possible.
Repeatedly writing forged checks is a crime. But every now and then people have checks that bounce. No big deal as long as the debt is ultimately paid.
We’ve all been there. I have no sympathy for this woman. If her salary got garnished, that’s perfectly legal. She had to know it was coming as a result of her own irresponsibility in failing to settle her bounced check.
Stupidity is expensive. Hope they learned their lesson.
“All your money are belong to us”.
If the school district didn’t send a certified mail/return receipt requested letter, IMO they did not do due diligence to collect before turning over to collection attorneys and then the courts.
The mother is, apparently, a doctor. Docs are known to work very long hours. Maybe a non-English speaking maid/nanny answered the phone, maybe the kids did. Maybe they get a ton of school district mail that gets thrown in the circular filing cabinet. They had only to send a $6 certified letter to back up their assertion that they ‘tried everything.’ Add a $10 s/h fee to the $30 + any return check fee. Lots less than $800/
It’s a Class C Misdemeanor in Texas. http://www.jp.hctx.net/checks/info.htm
She is paying for dodging the bill, not so much for the bounced check. The collection agencies have lawyers that process the court orders, so the $800 is about right for that.
As is blaming others for being caught with your pants down.
Moral of the tale here is to attend to your debts as soon as you can.
What seems like a small expense can add up fast.
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