Federal Exception To Wage Garnishment Protection
A lady contacted me about with a question about garnishment of her paycheck by the federal government because of defaulted student loan. The caller said the government told her they could garnish 10% of her take home pay even though she supported a child, and that Florida Statute 222.11, which exempts from garnishment all wages of a head of household, did not stop the government's garnishment for student loan default. The government cited their authority under 20 U.S.C. 1095(a) which is quoted, in part below.
Sec. 1095a. - Wage garnishment requirement
(a) Garnishment requirements
Notwithstanding any provision of State law, (emphasis added) a guaranty agency, or the Secretary in the case of loans made, insured or guaranteed under this subchapter and part C of subchapter I of chapter 34 of title 42 that are held by the Secretary, may garnish the disposable pay of an individual to collect the amount owed by the individual, if he or she is not currently making required repayment under a repayment agreement with the Secretary, or, in the case of a loan guaranteed under part B of this subchapter on which the guaranty agency received reimbursement from the Secretary under section 1078(c) of this title, with the guaranty agency holding the loan, as appropriate, provided that ....
Although I have never previously had a client facing this particular issue, I have now learned of an exception to Florida's unlimited wage garnishment protection where a federal law regarding education loan defaults specifically overrides state law.
I have heard (per FSA Forms) that the student loan garnishment process now precludes the due process provided by the US and Florida Constitution.
I have a phone hearing with the county court to hear the case pending where I owe a creditor $15,000 from 2000. What is the worst case, maximum wage garnishment they can level against me if judgement is in the creditors favor? I would like to know so I may plan for the worst if it happens.
I may have lawsuits coming...none filed yet. all of my assets are titled as tenants by the entireties. I am the only one who would be sued on the alleged debt. My wife has no relation to the alleged debt. Our assets have been titled in this manner for more than a year. If I am sued for my own alleged debts, are our assets protected?
Thanks
I was recently advised by my employer that she recieved a letter to garnish my wages for a student loan that I am in default. My ex-husband was ordered to pay this debt and others in our divorce 5 years ago, but apparently has not done so. What bothers me is that obviously the Dept. of Education knows where I work, and they can find out from my tax returns where I have lived for the past 4 years, but there have been NO attempts to contact me to resolve this issue. I am frustrated that out of the blue, I am told about this garnishment, and the debt collectors have done nothing to try to remedy it with me prior to attempting to garnish my wages. I have attempted to contact the representative handling my account, who of course, is unavailable. I am in a very bad situation now, as my husband was very abusive, and I really do not want to have to take him to court to enforce the original order. Any ideas?
I am also experiencing the same difficulties. My employer received paperwork to begin garnishing wages for a defaulted student loan. It appears that having an infant son does not affect the process. Any info would be greatly appreciated. I also have a credit card company threatening to garnish for a card I lived off of in college. Does anyone know if an agency other than federal has the right or ability to do this?
I am being sued for a default on an auto loan of 9000.00 I am a single dad and i am just making it now hcan they garnish my wages and if so what is the worst they can do. Please help..
I've had my wages garnished now for almost a year. I make about 440.00 a week. I seperated from my husband about 10 months ago and I have two small kids. I have daycare bills and the oldest is in school. They take around 135.00 out of my paycheck each week and I am barely getting by I may have to move in with my mom because of this. My last paycheck was 26.00 because my kids have been sick and I missed 3 days of work and they still took out the 135.00 I was never given anything about this garnishment to this very day. I recently read that florida laws has a limit where you cannot garnish wages of head of house if they make less then 500.00 weekly. How do I stop this. I dont have any money for a lawyer but I need to stop this so I can put food on the table. It is just getting to hard to pay the bills being a single parent without child support. please tell me how to stop this.
Can one garnish the someone's proceeds from a lawsuit if the person who owes money to you recently got awarded money from a judgement?
JH
If I have a civil suit judgement (not child support) against me personally in California, are there other states where I cannot be harassed by garnishments?
I have a defalted student loan...and they are hurrassing me with wage garnishment and etc. My ex-husband is a dead beat so I am raising my 5 year old on my own. I told them I could make payments by western union but they say they have to do it by checking account. I don't have one. I was a resident of Florida just moved to Indiana and can they do this here...my loans are from a college in florida. What can I do??
I received paperwork from an attorney's office which was representing a credit card creditor through default of payments. The paperwork was submitted and signed by a judge without my knowledge on March 27, 2006. It included an exemption affidavit and stated it had to be returned in twenty days. I returned certified mail, more than the attorney offered me, and they denied it for they claim I did not respond in February, 2006. I never received any exemption affidavit prior to March, 2006. Now my paycheck is being garnished, I am HEAD OF HOUSEHOULD FOR TWO DEPENDENTS. How did my rights get taken away? I did NOT go to court, get a court notice, or anyway to protect my assets. Does an attorney have to satisfy a judge they notified me? What happened to Subpoenas, notification by the court? I thought there was a Statue in Florida that protected a single parent providing more that 50% support for dependents against garnishment of wages?
I graduated from a private law school in 1993 and found the job market no where near as lucrative as described. I maintained student loan payments for twelve years afterwards, mostly using credit card debt to offset the overwhelming payments. The principle on the loans during that period increased 50% to around $100,000. After losing a job, I was unable to obtain Chapter 13 protection as student loans were the majority of my debt and equal creditor treatment would require payments way outside of my ability to pay. A Chapter 7 followed and I managed to consolidate all but three of the student loans with the Dept of Education that allowed repayments based on income. Five years later, the non-governmental student loans are seeking a judgement against me, wage garnishment and asset siezure (my 10-year old truck).
A sudden family death at graduation in 1993 left me with zero assets and no immediate family. I am unable to practice law, it requires a good credit rating in my state. I have not been able to figure out how to address this debt level that only continues to increase yearly. The loans were solely for tuition and books. At that time there were safety provisions in the bankruptcy codes for dismissal after x-number of years of repayment. As it is headed now, I expect the protections of Social Security may be the next to evaporate.
Monthly payments for me to repay by age 65 are nearly $1,265 or 75% of my present income. It is disheartening to know each day that I will never own a car or a home or be able to plan on staying in a permanent job. Not to mention knowing I am viewed as a deadbeat by many.
I believe my only possible solutions are the underground economy or emmigration. Any realistic comments would be appreciated.
I have 3 defaulted loans which have been sent to the credit agencies. at the time I went to school I had medical problems therefore I cannot pay these loans. can you recommend an attorney so I can resolve this case?
A car that I purchased back in 1999 unfortunately I had to give the car back because my brother had an accident in my other vehicle and left the accident. I am currently paying for that. Now I explained to the creditor that I could not obtain insurance on the vehicle due to the situation and my license were suspended indefinitely. I asked the creditor what should I do. These people wanted me to continue to pay for the vehicle that would be parked in their lot.(unknown whereabout of this alledgely lot). I told them that I did not know when I would be able to obtain my license again and I needed to take care of this situation of the accident. So therefore, I would need the money to take care of that problem. The creditors did not want to hear that and WANTED the car. I took the car to the creditor. Now, almost 5 years later they garnish my paycheck. I already don't make ANY money as it is. I am head of the house of three children. All I rec'd from them was a letter from my job that this was happening. Now what do I do to stop this CAR LOAN SHARK from garnishing my wages. And to add insult to injury the car was worth 10,000.00 and they want me to pay back more than 20,000.00. Please help me.
Are monthly payments from a reverse mortgage exempt from creditor action on unsecured debt?
I currently live off SSI and reverse mortgage payments secured by 60% of the approx $350K equity in my home. I dont really understand why Citibank is suing me on an unpaid credit card. My plan would be to file BK if they pursue judgement. I have lived in this home for more than 10 years.
PLEASE HELP ME! My husband and I are just on social security disability payments..The only income, we also have an 8yr. old boy..Today Jan 26 07 we received a letter from our bank that we were overdrawn,,which I never was for 12yrs with the same bank well I was upset and found out when I called the bank they said that a garnishment took all the money from our account..86.50 that is what we had left for food..We only receive 1,100 a month total.. We were never notified for anything nothing so now since the garnishment we have to pay the bank fees since the cks that I written out weren't covered..I don't know what we can do..Any help would be greatly appreciated as we are not to knowlegable about the laws regarding this..We only can think of an old medical bill and a car that was taken without our permission and wrecked and sold at auction and we were left with the remaining balance of 7,000 for a car that we dont have and was wrecked by someone else..The bal. of the loan they said..It happened in 04 bought the car 02 with ex. credit history Please someone advise us..Thank you Michele and family here in Fl. starving.broke and our rent takes most all of our 1,101 monthly income...
I receive a small retirement pension from a utility (electrical)company I worked for before I became sick/disabled. Is this pension exempt from garnishment by an unsecured judgement creditor ? Thank, Patrick
To day i receive a paper from work today stating that my wages will be garnish.I never receive any court order .I moved from n.y 3 yrs ago and not sure what the debt is all about since i have several ,no student loan .I am head of house hold with one child trying to make ends meet. Please is there any law in florida to protect me .
My dad business was suit in OHIO, as an officer of the company I was never served. The company obtained a default judgment against me. I am working with the company to help resolve the situation, however I do need to prepare myself for the worst. I live in florida, I'm the head of the household, can they garnish my wages, or better yet can I fight the default judgment.
I received a letter from job that my wages i being ganished because of an unpaid total bally fitness. Im a single mother with 2 kids heald of househould. I wount have any money left for my kids expenses or rent. Please help me what you i do. I laready sent a letter to court that i was heald of household please what should i do
in florida,how is amount of wage garnishment calculated--married woman,no dependents,not head of household,school teacher----thanks
You are a bunch of whining deadbeats.
PAY YOUR BILLS.
My mothers fathers milkmans sons girlfriend wrecked my car.. Who cares! Own up to your RESPONSIBILITIES!
Whiners.. Get a JOB!
My sister is 50 years old, lives in Florida, is totally disabled and receives social security disability. She is receiving threatening calls from a credit company who states that they are going to garnish her social security check (I think she gets ($800/month) and have told her that if she doesn't pay her parents (80 year old) are liable. The creditors keep asking for her bank account # and I have been explicit with her as to NOT give them that number. I believe that the dept is for an unsecured school loan (from the early '90's) which has been sold to a 3rd party creditor. Is there a statute of limitations that can protect her and my parents?
i owe money to chase credit card company and am with debt settlement program trying to settle my debt. chase already called me to court once and now they sent me final judgment paperwork where i need to include my bank account numbers. i did not do that, but they keep calling me and trying to get me to court. the account that i have with debt settlement program does not have enough funds to get a settlement done. I am a head of household, a single mother of one and home owner and wanted to find out if they have a way to garnish my wages? thanks.
I reaviced apart of my pension and put it inthe bank is my money protection from garnishment
Nobody is answering, so stop posting questions & go get a lawyer!
My Husbands ex-wife was court ordered to pay some $10,000 in bills that were incurred during there marriage. She moved to Florida and remarried. We live in Indiana were the bills were incurred now we are being sued for the money. She agreed to pay the bills and recieved half of his 401K to pay the bills which she did not. We also have custody of their two children. We also have my son and we also had a child two years ago. Is there any way to make her own up to the agreements she made with the courts here in Indiana?
any tips for pro se wife who won temp orders requiring husband to pay - meanwhile husband's lawyer withdraws - husband did not pay per orders - wife missed out on charging him with contempt - final decree entered giving wife money judgment for husbands portion of community debt incurred during the marriage -but.... husband had left state of washington without agreeing to divorce - goes to florida gets a person pregnant - has twins! all before the wife even filed for divorce - babies are born 6 months before divorce is final- now problem for wife is enforcing judgment - which will require wage garnishment of husband now being harbored by the state of florida whose 222.11 statute head of household - may prevent wage garnishment- but the husband is employed and makes well over $500 per week - wife does not know whether the "babies" have been legally named as his as he was not married to the mother and no longer associates with the mother but has the "babies" in his possession. wife will fight this but needs any advice any one has to offer as - the community debt incurred by the husband was quite substantial- and the husband basically abandoned or skipped town to avoid paying his debt in washington state and should not be excused from debt incurred before his new debt occurred - one would think ....
I have an answer for all of you people dealing with People garnishing your wages from your job. If you don't have a job then you can't get garnished, right. So to enlighten you on your problems, read carefully. Entrepreneurs built this country with what
I LIVE IN FLORIDA AND HAVE A ONLINE PAYDAY LOAN CAN THEY GARNISH MY WAGES. ELAINE
My husband and I income definitely don't pay all the bills. Our house is in foreclosure preceedings right now,student loan is threating to garnish my husband's wages.They did a financial analysis and saw where our ends don't meet.I am having surgery after surgery for tumors.Is there something that we can do,like a hardship program to help us.The mortgage took out another insurance even though we already have insurance and added more money onto our mortgage payments,this is not right.I feel we are being scammed by them because I have proof to show we already have a homeowners policy in place. All because of this,we got behind on our mortgage payments because we couldn't afford the extra insurance,now our house is due to be foreclosed on in Sept.08.Help!!
Thanks Helen, perhaps we need a little counterballence to this crazyness, but I see that you wrote this three years ago. Sure you are right, but what if someone owes more money than they could pay if they worked 160 hours per week for 250 years. Of course most people don't even have jobs any more. 80% of architects like me have been laid off. So what are we supposed to do? Worry about it? If you don't have a job and could never pay off your debt in ten lifetimes and your children go to bed hungry, the last thing you are going to worry about is some faceless corperation a thousand miles away. They want money. You don't have food. No sense worrying about money. So stop whining. Plant a garden!
I just notice on my paycheck a creditor garnishment,because of this garnishment i overdaft my bank account. I never received a letter of summoned from the creditor nor did i received a letter advising me of the garnishment. I am the head of the house. My father currently have cancer and i'm the only one working.My family and i need to move becasue i can't pay the house rent. Please help me I need every cent of my paycheck. What can i do?I live in the state of Florida.
Thank You