This happened to me. In Price, UT this type of shit is big business. It's not about repaying debt or anything like that. It makes the courts & the collection firm a shit ton of money. I had a $436 hospital bill that I had been paying on. There was something like $86 & sme change left on it & I lost my job. I called all my debtors & told them what was going on & worked out payment plans for each bill - this one included. About 2 or 3 weeks after talking to the hospital on the phone I got a collection letter from Professional Collections Inc. about the bill- but now it was up to something like $200 because of "fees". I call them, explain to them what happened. Told them about the conversation I had with the billing dept of the hospital etc. I was told I needed to pay the $200 & some odd dollars within the month or they'd take it to court. I could not pay it all at once so I tried to payment the $200 throughout the month. I think I sent them something along the lines of $70-$90 before the month was through. Keep in mind that I was very young & naive about the way the world actually works & I guess I thought that if I showed them I had all intentions of paying they'd be less dick-ish about it. They weren't. About 5 or 6 weeks after my inital contact with the professional collections people a cop came to my home & arrested me. I NEVER got anything from any court- I was never served a Goddamned thing (I later found out that a lot of the people who had the same thing happen to them never got served court papers). I was arrested in front of my crying daughter & had to leave her with a neighbor until my sister could come get her. I was handcuffed & sent to fucking jail over an $86 dollar hospital bill. Here's the real kicker though- my bail was a $500 cash only bond. When I called my dad for bail money he wouldn't give it to me because "Theres no such thing as debtors prisons anymore" and until I told him the real reason I was in jail he wasn't giving me the money. I ended up having to pawn my car in order to get out of jail. When I bailed out I recieved a court date. Went to court there were around 40 fucking people there who were all there because of bills ( in a small town like Price, Utah 40 people is a lot!) Anyways- they kept the $500 bail & I still had to pay Professional Collections the $200 PLUS interest. They did work out a payment plan with me but because of the intrest I'm sure I ended up paying them back closer to $400. It's wrong. I don't give a shit how much debt you have- the courts, businesses, & collection agencies should not have the right to do this to anyone. Like I said- it's a scam for profit, not about repaying a debt.