Who is the collection agency for Zellers?

We had a senior citizen who is a family freind visit and somehow a collection agency representing Zellers/Bay etc. found out where she was and decided to telephone her at our place....15+ times. This "thing" would not identify herself or the company she works for and tried to intimidate my wife over the telephone.
I don't have a credit card with this establishment nor does my wife because we agree that Zellers merchandise is garbage and the Bay is high priced garbage, we don't shop at these places.

I called Zellers head office to complain about this harassement by their collection agency and Nancy #1072 said she didn't support harassment but was unwilling to tell me how she was making an effort to stop it through due diligence. She didn't offer to put me through to her supervisor or someone who could answer my questions.

Is it protocol as a collection agent to
- make telephone calls to people who are not involved in the situation?
-Try to intimidate these people
-Not provide their name, supervisors name and the collection agency they are representing when asked.
-Continue to make these harassing telephone calls when they are told their behaivour is unwanted.

GDS Messenger

More good news! That's good to hear that you're getting some where.

Sometimes the process takes a while.

Keep us all up to date with how things are progressing.!

Glen thanks for your information, you really explained great detail. Thanks to you I now have my hearing date. So let me understanding this next step. When I show up on my date the judge will then decide if I have grounds to restart the process or not correct? If he does restart the process then we go back to the beginning starting with the Tenant issueing a new statement of claim or do we just pickup from the original statement of claim? And, I assume that the 2 year limitation will no longer have any weight is this 2nd time around, I think even so it would be under the 6 year limitation since the original breach took place in 2003, and they filed the original statement of claim in 2004.

The agent has now contacted me to make a deal which seem very suspicous since the garnishment is already registered with the courts and all they should be waiting on is their 1st payment which is this week.

Nonetheless thank you all for your help. It is really nice to find a site like this that guides people through these things.

Here's a repost of my Oct 31 posting (which seems to have been misplaced), explaining in more detail the new provincial limitation acts on debt.

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http://www.e-laws.gov.on.ca/DBLaws/Statutes/English/02l24_e.htm

http://www.pjva.ca/newsletter/fall02/03.php

Re: New limitation periods on debt:

The first link contains the Ontario Limitations Act of 2002 on the official Ont.Government website while the second link deals with the corresponding Alberta Act. There are millions of other links on Google to these Acts also.

The Ontario Limitations Act of 2002 which was phased in and became effective on Jan.1 2004 made sweeping changes to the limitation periods covering most types of unsecured debt. It's modelled on a similar law, The Alberta Limitations Act which came into effect on March 1, 1999 in that province. Perhaps the other provinces have similar laws in place by now. The Ontario and Alberta Acts were designed to simplify the preexisting myriad of limitation periods covering the many different types of claims. The Ontario Act is designed to cover most types of UNSECURED debt such as loans and credit cards. It doesn't deal with chattel loans. Nor does it cover real estate which is governed by The Real Property Limitations Act. As well, some other types of unsecured debts such as student loans with their components, welfare and EI overpayments and some criminal assault awards are treated differently. But for most types of bank loans, credit card debts and tort claims of injury, the plaintiff now has 2 years, not 6 years any longer, to file a claim. Crucial to the understanding of these Acts as to when the new limitation period starts is the issue of discoverability. The period starts as soon as the claimant knew or ought to have known that a breach occurred. Notice the new reverse onus criterion. See, in particular, section 5 of the Ontario Act. It's now up to the plaintiff to prove that if more than 2 years have elapsed (since the breach of contract or wrong) that he could not have reasonably known about it. If he can't do this, that means that, after 2 years, the plaintiff is stats barred, no matter how meritiorious his claim. In practice, this period would probably start no later than after 3 consecutive payments have been missed on a loan or a credit card. The lender or bank or whoever will have sent you a statement that your account is seriously overdue or revoked.

It's very important to keep all your old statements because banks, lawyers and collection agents will pretend not to know about these Acts, will huff, puff, bluff and threaten to sue even though there's about 3.95 million links on Google to the Ontario Act alone. Copies of your account statements will provide proof that the limitation period has been exceeded, if, in fact, it has been in your case. An interesting example of what I'm talking about follows.

I know of one very unfortunate and troubled long term accident victim whose retail HBC card account was bought up by ARO of Richmond, BC for a few pennies on the dollar. With the card's 28.8% monthly interest rate (actually 32.3% annual effective rate) his bill had mushroomed to almost $20,000 in just over 2 years. ARO (in their carelessness) thought they still had 6 years to sue in Ontario. They were almost right. The new Ontario Act applies only to debts defaulting after Jan. 1, 2004. Defaults discovered before that date are still grandfathered and the 6 year period still applies. The HBC debt this person had was defaulted on Jan. 27, 2004. He also missed his Dec 27, 2003 payment, but because HBC dispensed with any minimum payment due for the Christmas season, he has a statment dated Dec. 27, 2003 showing "Total Payable, $0.00. If this person had not saved that single scrap of paper, right now he'd be in debt for probably $50,000 by the time these Holloween Vampires had finished with him in Superior Court. ARO swore up and down that there was no such limitation period of 2 years before going off in a huff and hanging up. (Don't go away mad - just go away!) After all, the Bay or ARO are certainly not going to give you copies of your old statements so you can defend yourself in court. It doesn't get much closer than that! Save your statements! --------------------------------

The Small Claims Court Act of Ontario (Section 8.10) allows you to file a motion to set aside a default judgement if you didn't receive a prior Notice of Statement of Claim (Form 7A) being filed agaist you. This seems to be a favorite technique among collection agencies: filing a claim against a defendant, deliberately mailing it to the wrong address and then filing an affidavit of service (Form 8A) with the court. [The latter is a form swearing that they served you with a summons] and then getting a default judgement without the defendant being there to contest it. Easy, no questions asked.

You need to file a motion to set aside a default judgement with the small claims court. Here's what to do:

Either download from the internet (Look under Attorney General of Ontario) or go to The Small Claims Court Office for Toronto at 47 Sheppard Ave. East, 3'rd floor and pick up a Form 15A, Form 15B and a Form 8A. Form 15 A is the Notice of Motion Form. It is 4 pages long. On page 1, you will have to enter the court claim file number and the details about who the plaintiff was in the action and also who the defendant was. Make sure you get this info from the court and enter it exactly as they have it recorded on your judgement record - don't guess. On page 2, check the 2 boxes marked "set aside default judgement" and "leave to file a defence." Page 4 will then ask you to name what documents you will be relying on as a basis of showing reasons why you never received any Statement of Claim. Maybe give them copies of a driver's licence or phone bills from the period during which the claim originated to show that it was delivered to the wrong address. Include these copies with the forms when you submit them.

Next, fill out Form 15B which is an affidavit (sworn statement) explaining the reasons why you never received any notice of the action on pages 2 and 3. "Floppy F" referred to the time constraint being "as soon as possible." It refers to the necessity of notifying the court and filing a motion as soon as possible after learning of the judgement. Ohterwise, the judge will deny it. However, there is no time limit on filing a motion after a default judgement has been obtained, only that you do it ASAP after learning about it. The 20 day period referred to is the normal response time that a defendant has to file a defence against the plaintiff's statement of claim.

When you've done that, make 2 additional copies of everything including your documents. One copy is for the court, the 2nd is for you and the 3'rd copy is the one you're going to serve on the plaintiff.

Next, return to the court office and see the court clerk. At this point you will sign and swear the affidavit portion or Form 15B and the clerk will set a date for the motion hearing (usually around 3 months later). She will then stamp all the 3 copies so that you don't pull any switcharoos. You now have to deliver the 3rd copy to the plaintiff notifying him that a motion is being made. You have 12 calendar days or 7 business days BEFORE the hearing date to do this. Just mail it to them if you like. AFTER delivering or sending this copy you must fill out the (Form 8A). This is an another Affidavit of Service You then go back to the court office to submit the affidavit and pay the $40.00 fee. I think they take cash. Then you just show up on the appointed motion date.

If your motion is granted then that will start the ball game all over. If so, then, you should contact the sheriff's office which is located at 40 Dundas St. West, Toronto, across fom the Eaton Center in order to suspend any outstanding writs against you. You'll need to show them the court documents of the granted motion (assuming you get one). Don't merely assume that the court will do this for you or just mail something in because, if writs are issued against you, they will be outstanding until the bailiffs take them off their system. That's how people lose their cars and homes unnecessarily. Possession in these case is often 90% of the law.

By way of explanation, writs or orders for seizure of assets to satisfy outstanding judgements generally take the form of seizing bank accounts, real estate and personal property such as cars (with no other liens on them and having a red book value of over $5500.00). But these writs require large deposits from the creditor with the sheriff and so they usually go after the easiest pickings (as all collection agencies do). That is, of course, garnisheeing wages. If they know where you work, all they have to do is have the bailiff deliver a Notice of Garnishment (Form 20) to your employer to embarrass you like nothing else. While a collector is not allowed to identify himself to your employer, a bailiff certainly is after a judgement has been issued.

Another point. If your motion is granted and a pretrial conference is held, the validity of the contract you cosigned will be scrutinized carefully. The plaintiff sought 4 months rent as consequential injury damage. Does he expect the court to believe it took him 4 months to rent an apartment in a place like Toronto? Was the place a dump? Did he make reasonable efforts to rent it? Where did he advertise? Does he have receipts for these ads that he can show the court? Then check out the ads on the web if possible. If he was asking rent above the market value, then that would not be an excuse for the delay and expecting you to cover for it. This is an opportunity to renegotiate all that stuff. As long as they've got a judgement they don't need to.

The new Ontario Limitations Act of 2002 applies to injuries occurring or debts that went into default after Jan.1, 2004 AND the injured party knew or ought to have known about it by then. In those cases, that is for most unsecured debts, the plaintiff now has 2 years from the date of discovery of the breach or injury to file a statement of claim in court. It's no longer 6 years. I posted a longer article explaining it on Oct. 31, 2006 which I'll repost after this because I think it might have been taken down. Many paralegals and collection agents don't want people to know about it for obvious reasons. They'll tell you it's still 6 years. But in your case, it doesn't look like it'll make a difference because, even if it were applicable, they still filed a claim within 2 years.

Don't worry about going to jail. That only happens when the creditor serves a Notice of Examination of Assets on an unco-operative person who won't pay up on a judgement and they refuse to show up for a court examination of their financial means. A judge then can then issue a Warrant of Committal for Contempt of Court. The plaintiff here doesn't need to examine your assets - they already know where you work.

Glen

Can you explain this a little more...

if not what can I say to have the court order a lesser amount they are claiming that it took them 3-4 months to re-rent the unit hence the bill for over 4K they have not filed against the other person on the application the original statement of claim back in 2004 had his name on it but the default judgement in 2005 and now this garnishment only has my name

The best thing to do is get all of your paper work together. A court will appreciate good accounting. If you are living up to your contract, the court will judge in your favor. They have to have crystal clear evidence that what you're saying can be supported by documentation.

So the drama continues on Nov. 1/06 the collection agency filed a notice of garnishment they sent a copy over to my Payroll person but I have yet to receive a copy none the less I went over to the Toronto Court I have been told I have to file a motion and an affidavit stating that I was not notified of the proceeding in order to reopen the case just before I do this can anyone tell me:

1) is this something that I need a lawyer to be invovled with, if so anyone know where I can begin to find a lawyer familiar with these kinds of cases

2) if not what can I say to have the court order a lesser amount they are claiming that it took them 3-4 months to re-rent the unit hence the bill for over 4K they have not filed against the other person on the application the original statement of claim back in 2004 had his name on it but the default judgement in 2005 and now this garnishment only has my name

Help!

Testing 123

If the collection agency has sent you a copy of default judgement and you donot even know that a court proceeding was started, your time to respond within 20 days has lapsed and due to your lack of response by filing statement of defence, the court has issued automatic default judgement then you must take immediate help from lawyer to put forth your side of the story to the court.

Failure to do so will result in wage garnishment. You need to act quickly assuming that you have verified default judgement with the court.

Please check and post the details based on information above

Thanks for your reply, it settles my mind a little bit and I will definately start noting the calls. I did speak with HR and they will not speak with the collection person. He has called them several times claiming to be in the process of issueing a garnishment, but they have not returned any of his calls. He has since sent a fax with a cover page that had the reason for the fax and all my personal information (name, dob, SIN) on the front and a copy of a notice of default judgment addressed only to Payroll which the receptionist collected and forwarded to HR. They still have not responded to his fax, called me again claiming to have filed the garnishment papers but I have not returned his call.

Is it possible that he has done of this, in terms of getting an order from the court, I have not received anything . He knows where I live but I noticed on the default notice that the address is the address of the rental unit which was vacated. I am still a little confused about how the limitation factor works. Is it 2 years from there original judgment order in small claims (if there is one) and is that 2 yearsnot only for anything after 2004.