My bestfriend and I decided to apply for a credit card for each of us and both were granted. We always pay our bills at the same time since we both live and work in the same place. We paid our bills regularly although there were a few times that we were late in paying our bills. But we also pay the additional late charges fee. After almost 2 years, my friend's credit card bill was passed on to a collecting agency. The collecting agency then demand that my friend pay the full amount and was charged with a bigger interest. We asked the credit card company on why they passed my friend's card to the collecting agency and all they said was because of late payment. I told them that it was only a few times and that we have paid the late payment charges fee and if that is the reason, then my bill should also be sent to the collecting agency since we both pay at the same time. I sent them scanned copy of all our bill payments and they agreed that they made a mistake. However, they cannot take it back and just asked my friend to pay the full amount in one time payment so that she won't be blacklisted, which we cannot do because of the big charges that the collecting agency had added. My friend stood her ground that she will not pay since she is not the one who made the mistake. The company and the collecting agency also stopped pestering her. Maybe because they realized it was their mistake. Other people said that we could sue the company but we just didn't bother.
I'm afraid there isn't much you can do about it, assuming what they did is covered by the terms and conditions that applied when your friend signed up with them. It's fairly standard procedure for banks to sell other people's debt to collecting agencies. What your friends needs to do is talk to a lawyer to see what the best course for action is.
