safe or not?

[DYLAN150]

I owed U.S. bank about 15K for credit card debt. They sold the account to some Junk debt buyer.
Would it be safe to open an an account with U.S. Bank? Reason being is the atm's in the local market are U.S. bank machines and I could save a little money.

[justbroke]

I owed U.S. bank about 15K for credit card debt. They sold the account to some Junk debt buyer.
Would it be safe to open an an account with U.S. Bank? Reason being is the atm's in the local market are U.S. bank machines and I could save a little money.

Did you discharge the debt? I'm just wondering. I had a similar issue with SunTrust. I tried to open an account and they actually allowed me to open the account. However, they closed it about 4 weeks later for "prior" debt. I did the same with another bank (where I discharged $$$$s from credit card debt), and they allowed me to open the account. The account is still open and active after 3 years (post discharge). They have not bothered me!

Short answer is, if the $15K was not discharged in a bankruptcy, I would not take the chance. We always say... don't bank (demand deposit accounts or timed deposit accounts) where you have credit products. (There are some exceptions.)

[DYLAN150]

I start a new account with a different bank, no problems.

[GoingDown]

If they sold it to a junk debt buyer, they no longer own the defaulted account, and you no longer owe the 15K to them. You can't owe the same 15K to both the junk debt buyer and the original creditor at the same time.

Do you have the letter from the junk debt buyer saying that they purchased the account from U.S. Bank? If so, what did it say? How did they phrase it?

Just as an example, I owed Wells Fargo 13K for a credit card debt. They sold it to a junk debt buyer named Hilco Receivables. Once they sold the debt to Hilco, I never heard from Wells Fargo about the debt ever again. They were through with me. They stopped updating their negative trade line on my credit report in 2006. They never called me again. They never sent me any collection notices in the mail after that.

In my opinion, I could have opened a checking account at Wells Fargo, and I doubt that they would have made any attempt to seize my money in that account to pay off the old defaulted debt.

Once they sell it off to a junk debt buyer, the original creditor is out of the picture from then on.

But, that's just my opinion. It is always better to be safe than sorry, if you have any doubts about it.