Help Me! Can a Coolection Agency or Bank sue me after 3yrs has past with no payments?

Yes, the Statute of Limitation is 6 years in PA and 4 years in GA.
http://www.bankrate.com/brm/news/cc/2004...

You are probably dealing with Junk Debt Buyer (JDB). JDBs buy old credit card debts for 2 or 3 cents on the dollar. They seem to get overly aggressive right before the SOL is about to expire.

If you decide to settle the debt, you could prop ably negotiate
a settlement for a fraction of the original debt.

Before you pay them anything, however, get a "Delete for Payment" agreement with them first. They must delete any derogatory trade lines from the credit bureaus. Otherwise, it will still be a derogatory trade line marked as "paid" or "settled".

A collection agency cannot garnish your wages or put liens on your bank accounts and other assets without first taking you to court and getting a civil judgment against you.

It does not matter how long the debt has been with the collection agency, it matters the date of your last delinquency that goes back to the original creditor. So if your last payment was 11/04 your date of delinquency would be 12/04. For both GA and PA Open Ended Accounts(Credit Cards) have a Statute of Limiations of 4 years. So the company could file a suit against you up until 12/08.

I am very surprised that you have a 704 credit score with a collection account, but if in fact it is not on there you need to be careful. If the agency has been contacting you lately there is a good chance that they could put it on there at any time. Unlike the SOL this can be listed for 7 years from the date of delinquency. If it gets put on there you can expect quite a drop in your score.

A company can not garnish your wages until they file a suit and get a judgement against you. Then it would depend on the state as to if they can garnish your wages.

As to if you should settle. Ideally you want to pay off the collection account if they agree to remove it from your report. If this item shows up as paid or settled it is still a collection on your report which is a negative item. If they won't remove it and you do pay it that will look better than being unpaid, but not as good as if it was never on there to begin with. The problem with them agreeing to remove the collection account is that they usually won't do that unless you pay it in full. But before you send any money to them be sure to have the agreement in writting.

The collections has until 11/04 to place a judgement against
you and if you do not show up in court, they win by default

Revolving credit in PA is 4 years. I don't know about Georgia

However, they cannot do anything to you until they validate
the debt. First you get the credit reporting agencies
to validate (but you say it not on your report)
and then you validate with the collector.

Then they will either validate with you (the website will
tell you want they need for proof positive) or they
will file a false judgement in which you show up
and in court and say proof it. A signed contract
just shows you applied not received a card.

www.creditinfocenter.com

I worked for a collection agency years ago. The statute of limitations was 3 years from date of last payment, but it can remain on your credit report up to 7 years. However, if they are telling you it's not on your credit report and you have been pre-approved.. .I wouldn't worry about settling it at this point. One important thing, if your mortgage has not been underwritten by the company itself, they may uncover it and place it as a condition that must be completed before they'll approve you. Even the pre-approvals are sometimes based on credit score and income alone. Check with your loan officer.

Yes they can, the statute of limitations in BOTH Penn & Georgia on credit card debt is 4 years, so they have until 11/08 to file suit.

Have you even validated the debt??? Have you even made sure that person who is trying to collect from you "owns" the debt?Befor you pay one red cent Validate the debt.