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This is where debt collectors come to roost and flame each other and all consumers foolish enough to venture into the kingdom of the fringe lunatics

E. Normis

Expert Spin Doctor

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Joined: October 12 2004

Location: United States

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Posts: 1465

Posted: September 04 2006 at 5:05am | IP Logged Report Post Quote E. Normis

No response? Priceless.

Here's a classic Bil-LIE post:

The Federal Courts have ruled that attorneys may not demand any fees whatever from a defendant in a judgment since the attorney has no contract with a debtor nor has he performed any service for the debtor.

An attorney only has a client relationship with the creditor and it is to the creditor to whom he must look for his fees, not the debtor. Therefore an attorney who demands and gets attorney fees from a debtor through judgment has committed a fraud upon the court, he has committed a fraud upon the debtor and he is liable for unlimited damages and loss of his authority to practice law upon conviction of a felony against the defendant. It's not easy to get the job done, but it can be done and it has been done and it has been done by pro se litigants. Pretty hard to get one thief to go after another in a court of law.

The judgment will always be overturned for fraud on those grounds alone although it may have to be taken to higher courts to get justice. You want to keep on telling me what the courts have ruled and I'll pop the cases up here so fast it'll make your fool head swim.

Ok Bil-LIE, how about just one case?

And here is how he was proven wrong.

Creditwrench

Expert Member

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Joined: October 16 2004

Location: United States

Online Status: Online

Posts: 1580

Posted: September 05 2006 at 9:44pm | IP Logged Quote Creditwrench

And since you think you know so much and actually know nothing at all about much of anything, including how collection attorneys get their pay, I'll let collections attorney Michael Herin from Memphis Tennessee teadh you how it is done. As everybody will quickly notice, he says not one word about getting his fee from the debtor but rather all about the different ways a creditor might pay his attorney for collecting his debts.

Here is attorney Michael Herin's words on the matter of how collections attorneys get paid.

Collections attorney Michael Herin wrote:

The Different Ways To Pay Your Attorney To Collect Your Debts

Probably the biggest reason that small businesses chose to write off bad debt rather than pursue legal debt collection is they hear the age old adage of don’t waste good money after bad ringing in their head. Small business owners have a perception that it will cost them more in attorney’s fees to legally collect a debt than the debt is worth in real dollars. This perception was created by and is perpetuated by the legal profession. Too often attorneys have taken a collection matter for an hourly fee and treated it just like any other piece of litigation without regard for the client or for the debtor they are pursuing. The attorney "works" the file running up the bill without focusing on the ultimate goal of getting the debt paid. The end result is that the client pays three times the amount of the debt in attorney’s fees and at the end of the day only has a piece of paper from the court saying the debtor legally owes them money. In that case, the attorney has done a disservice to both the client and the legal profession.

When a debt collection lawyer takes a case, he should make a fundamental determination of whether the debt is collectable. If the debt is not reasonably collectable, the debt collection lawyer should candidly discuss that with the client and let the client make the decision as to whether or not to pursue the debtor. Once the decision is made to sue the debtor, the debt collection lawyer should devise a plan to get the debt paid. Payment of the debt is the goal and the debt collection lawyer must keep that goal foremost in his mind and in his actions. . The goal is not to milk the client out of fees, nor is it to punish the debtor, nor is it to get a judgment, nor is it harass, intimidate or scare the debtor. The only goal is to get the client paid the most money possible in the shortest period of time. Sometimes, that goal doesn’t even require the lawyer to file a lawsuit and sometimes it requires the lawyer to abandon what he thinks is an excellent suit in exchange for a good settlement. All of that said, once a creditor decides to hire an attorney and sue a debtor, the subject of how to pay the attorney must be discussed.

There are essentially two fundamental ways to pay an attorney; by the hour and as a percentage of what he collects. Some attorneys will only work by the hour. Hourly rates can vary greatly depending upon geography, experience and quality. If you hire an attorney by the hour, you will most likely pay him in one of two ways. The first way is for him to bill you each month for the time he spent working on your case. You should receive an itemized bill telling you exactly what he did, how long it took him and how much it cost you. You would then mail your attorney a check paying that invoice. The second method of hourly billing is to have the client deposit a retainer. A retainer is a sum of money deposited with the lawyer that the lawyer bills against. You should still receive a monthly invoice from the lawyer showing you exactly what he did, how long it took him and how much it cost you, but you will not have to mail him a check. The invoice will also tell you the retainer balance. The items that are negotiable with an hourly charge lawyer are: (1) his hourly rate, (2) the smallest increment of time for which he will bill–if he answers the phone and talks a minute is that charge recorded as a tenth of an hour, a quarter of an hour, etc., and (3) the amount of any up front retainer.

The second way to pay your attorney is as a percentage of what he collects. Most people call this a contingency fee, as his fee is contingent upon him actually collecting something. The client will be responsible for paying expenses such as the filing fee, but not an hourly rate for work the attorney performs. When the attorney collects money from the debtor, he will deduct a percentage as his fee. The amount of that percentage may be determined by the volume of cases that client is placing with the attorney, the dollar amount of the debt sought to be collected or the expected difficulty in collecting the debt. The items that can be negotiated with a continency fee lawyer are; (1) the amount of the percentage, (2) what items will be regarded as expenses and (3) at what point will the attorney’s fee be deducted.

A third way to pay your debt collection attorney is by blending the hourly rate and percentage. There are any number of ways to customize a billing method to suit a client’s needs and ability to pay. A simple method provides for an hourly fee to be charged on each account up to a maximum ceiling at which point the attorney begins working on a continency basis. Another way is to utilize a sliding percentage based upon the amount of the debt.

A fourth way to pay your debt collection attorney is to utilize an attorney fee provision in your contract. Make your customer responsible for paying all of the cost of collection, including a reasonable attorney’s fee, if collection becomes necessary. The attorney would then be paid a percentage of the debt (as determined by the court) in addition to recovery of 100% of the balance of the debt. The attorney then keeps that amount as a court awarded attorney’s fee.

A fifth way to pay your debt collection attorney is to exchange services. The act of bartering has experienced a resurgence with the advent of internet web sites like www.craigslist.org. You may be able to pay your attorney by providing the services your business offers in exchange for "free" legal work.

Here is a bit from his bio showing he has been practicing law for more years than you have somehow miraculously survived.

Michael Herin, collections attorney wrote:

I graduated from the University of Mississippi School of Law in 1990. I am admitted to practice in the states of Tennessee, Alabama, and Mississippi..

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