Home › Forums › Open Discussion › Parking ticket turned into Collections! (AllianceOne)
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January 20, 2012 at 6:08 pm #601932
tlswartwMemberI need help please. My girlfriend received a parknig ticket while driving my car. However she decided not to pay it, thinking it wouldn’t matter. Well turns out she was wrong. I pulled my credit report to find a negative account from AllianceOne. Turns out Seattle turns unpaid tickets into collections. I’ve spoken with them and explained the situation and faxed them a signed letter from my girl friend admitting it was her, but the only thing they would say is that it is my debt, because its my car. My concern is that even if it’s paid it will always show on my credit as a late paid account. Has anyone else had experience or suggestions how to get this removed?
January 20, 2012 at 6:32 pm #745609
BostonmanMemberThis happened to me. When I got divorced my ex wife got my fully paid for Honda Pilot a year old. It was in my name and she never changed the title. About 3 months ago I got a call about a parking ticket on the car after the divorce. I told them I could fax the divorce papers and everything, she even called and said it was her.
In the end I had to pay it, fortunatly they had not reported it to my credit yet. I hate to tell you but you are going to have to pay it. I would then send a letter with your girlfriends letter notorized into all 3 collection agencies to see if you can get it removed.
January 20, 2012 at 7:01 pm #745610
goodgracesParticipantAlliance One is horrible and, IMHO, skirting the limits of the law with their collection practices. Please be careful and pay them as soon as you hear about a Seattle Municipal (non-criminal) parking/driving ticket that’s gone to them. If you don’t, they will levy your bank account and not alert you until the levy has taken place. This situation happened to us for ONE parking ticket. It was a $55 ticket that, in the end, cost us $390.
We truly believe this is a racket — A1 gets the unpaid-for tickets and makes a single lame attempt to get you to pay them. If you don’t (because you don’t receive something from them or ignore them), it will eventually end up as a levy. The entire time (4 to 6 mos) in between you will hear or receive NOTHING from them, until the funds are seized in your bank account. Only that day (and exactly on that day) will you receive a levy notice in the mail. And that notice will have been dated 6–8 weeks prior — but it was strategically mailed to not arrive until after the funds have been taken. A1’s position is that it says on the back of every ticket that unpaid citations can/will be automatically leveraged against your financial institution(s).
If I had more time/$$$/moxie I would totally fight to have these folks investigated. In the meantime, until that day, I will warn anyone and everyone to stay clear of them. To be clear: I am NOT saying that the city is not entitled to the funds from unpaid tickets — only that their (A1’s) collection practices are deceitful and designed to maximize their own profits.
And, yes, I did file a complaint with the state AG’s office, but nothing ever came of it. Very suspicious, if you ask me, since A1 is basically the collection arm of the city gov’t.
January 20, 2012 at 7:21 pm #745611
mehud7ParticipantDid your girlfriend not tell you about the ticket?
January 21, 2012 at 1:17 am #745612
Garden_nymphMemberShe blew off the ticket and thought it wouldn’t matter?!
January 21, 2012 at 3:07 am #745613
waterworldParticipanttlswartw: The City is authorized to turn unpaid tickets over to a collections agency. The rules that apply to collections agencies are in the Washington statutes, at RCW 19.16. In particular, look at RCW 19.16.250, which lists the things a collections agency is not allowed to do when trying to collect a debt. It also lists certain steps that the agency must comply with before it takes certain kinds of actions against you. There are some parts of that statute that deal with reporting the debt to the credit bureaus, or to your employer, or to other businesses, such as your bank.
If you believe the collection agency has not complied with the letter of the law, you might be able to get a lawyer to sue them or even sue them in small claims court yourself. It has been done before (although not nearly often enough) and when the collection agencies are not playing by the rules, they lose.
As others have said, you are probably responsible for the ticket at this point. Under the Seattle Municipal Code, the ticket itself that’s placed on the car is considered legal “notice” to the owner. Even if the owner was not the one who parked illegally, he or she is presumed by law to be the person responsible for the infraction. The only way to beat that presumption is to contest the ticket, go the hearing, and testify. Since that didn’t happen, the result is a judgment against the registered owner of the car.
January 21, 2012 at 4:05 pm #745614
MagpieParticipantThey can’t legally hit your bank account without due process. That would require that take certain steps in order to collect, like serving you with papers, getting a judgment, etc.
They can, however, affect your credit by slapping the collection on your credit file.
You can always try to make a deal with them to pay it and see if they will remove it. Once it s paid, it is much less of a ding than uppaid and in my understanding of the credit bureau scoring models, one parking ticket that is paid does not have a major affect on your overll score if everything else is good.
Sounds like time for a serious discussion with your girlfriend!
January 21, 2012 at 4:32 pm #745615
DIzzleMember1) Pay the ticket
2) Break-up with your girlfriend
If she isn’t telling you about parking tickets, what is she not telling you!!!
January 23, 2012 at 10:18 pm #745616
queseraMemberUnfortunately, you’re SOL. You might be able to talk to the credit agencies into taking it off your record, but you’re stuck paying the ticket AND all the fees.
This happened to my boyfriend too, when his roommate borrowed his car and illegally parked it multiple times. They make ZERO effort to notify the owner because the fees are worth more than the ticket itself. When my boyfriend called the city, he was told it’s his responsibility to know if he has pending tickets.
Personally, I think we should take the city up on this and all make a habit of calling them a couple of times per month to ask if we have any tickets we don’t know about. I think after call 10,000 or so, they’ll realize they should make more of an effort to tell us about parking tickets :)
I seriously want to call the city every day and ask them if I have tickets. Hey, it was their advice that I check!
January 23, 2012 at 11:11 pm #745617
todd_ParticipantGood point quesera!
January 23, 2012 at 11:11 pm #745618
skeeterParticipantLet me get this right. The city does not send a single letter before turning the account to collections? That seems extremely unfair. What if the ticket blows away or someone just takes it off your car before you get back?
January 24, 2012 at 6:11 am #745619
maplesyrupParticipantIf you ever end up marrying that girl, don’t put her in charge of paying the mortgage.
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