Bank error (not) in your favor...go directly to...

I'll not finish that sentence despite my urges to the contrary. I'm hopping mad! Got a letter yesterday from a debt collector. I have to contest the debt in writing within 30 days or a permanent mark will go on my credit report. I'm not saying I have nosebleed-high credit or anything, but my credit is pretty darn good, so needless to say, this got me a bit concerned.

See, when I left UCSD, they overpaid me by $85.94. Keep in mind I was a salaried employee and never once turned in a time card. It was their fault they overpaid me in the first place. But this bank error has ended up being anything but in my favor. They wanted their 86 bucks back and began harassing me about it within a few months of my leaving the job. Fine! I paid the darn $86, but letters from payroll kept coming. So I kept calling payroll, and they insisted they had a record of my payment. They claimed it must not have made it all they way through the system yet, and that I should just ignore their recent correspondence. So I did...until yesterday.

Yesterday's letter wasn't from UCSD, it was from a debt collector. Woah! Hold up! Again, just to confirm I wasn't delusional, I uploaded an image of the cleared check from my bank's website. Nope, not crazy. This bill had been paid. The stamp on the back said "UCSD Cashier" and it was dated February 8, 2008. It even had the name of the person who endorsed it. So what did I do? Well, I called the Cashier and asked to speak to Mrs. Endorser. Once on the phone, she tried to locate the cashier's copy of the check. Of course, she couldn't. That was at 9 am. I was promised they'd find their copy of the check and I'd get a call back by 3pm. 3:20 came, and I admit I was getting peeved...but at 3:24 the phone rang, and their record of the check had been found.

Turns out the money had been deposited in the general fund and never transfered to the office in charge of clearing my debt. Nice Mrs. Endorser had the money transfered, and even called the debt collector in person to take me off their hit list. Though she seemed perfectly competent, I've had far too many dealings with the cashier's office to trust anyone there at this stage. I will still be calling the collection agency directly, and following up, maybe 3 or 4 times with the cashier's office. Especially now that I know that the cashier is just the first stop in a long line of transactions that apparently need to take place for a measly 86 bucks (that they should never have paid me in the first place) to get from me, to clear my debt. This poor $86 has been en route for more than 6 months! To bad it couldn't go directly to....