The debt collection law firm of Kleinman, Saltzman and Bolnick, obtained a default judgment against our client for an alleged student loan that she owed. They did so on behalf of their client Arrowood Indemnity Co., a common guarantor/insurer of private student loan lenders. The amount owed had increased over $20,000 and Kleinman was looking to try and enforce the judgment by either garnishing our client’s wages or levying her bank account. Our client like most consumers in New York was never served with an initial summons and complaint and thus lost this case on default which caused this judgment to be placed against her.
We contacted Kleinman to show them that our client was not living at the address served at the time of the alleged service thus she could not have possibly been served. They then agreed to vacate the judgment against our client but wanted to put the case back on the general calendar so that it could proceed with litigation. To save our client a ton of legal fees, we were able to negotiate a settlement for her and were able to cut the debt down to $7,500. Besides the substantial reduction, we were also able to place her on a three year re-payment plan at no interest. We were able to use all the leverage we had in this situation including vacating the judgment against our client as well as using her severe financial and medical hardship which Arrowood takes into consideration to obtain a great settlement.