Our payments have been drafted from our account biweekly for ten years now and have never been returned. Last month my husband was laid off from work temporarily and I contacted VMF to inform them of this and that the money would probably not be in there when they went to draft the payment until he returned to work. "Norman" told me that as long as I let them know what was going on they would work with me and advised me to put a stop payment on that amount they draft until he went back to work and I could mail in my payments until everything got worked out and we started receiving unemployment checks.
I kept contacting him and informing him of what was going on and then one day I received a phone call from "Jeanie Myers" wanting to know what the problem was and when we were going to make the payment. She said Norman turned the account over to her because it was so delinquent (a week and a half late) and she was trying to collect the payment. I explained the situation to her and told her what Norman told me to do and she demanded to know when we would be getting unemployment checks and I explained to her that I had no idea because we had never been through this and we couldn't even call to claim a check until three weeks after he was laid off.
Two weeks after the initially speaking to Norman I contacted VMF and told them I was mailing them a payment and they told me I had to send it Western Union which I found out costs around $20 so I dropped the payment in the mail that day.
I just got a phone call from "Jeanie" wanting to know if I sent the payment Western Union and I informed her I did not because it costs $20 and right now we couldn't afford any extra expenses such as that. She then raised her voice with me and said that is the price that I have to pay when my payments get so far behind and if she did not recieve the check by this coming Friday she would proceed with foreclosure (although the payment still is not even 30 days late!). She then proceeded to tell me that she "specifically told me NOT to mail it and to overnight it or Western Union it". I explained to her once again that my husband just returned to work today and things would be caught up in a few weeks, but that did not matter because she kept threatening with foreclosure on Friday if she did not have a payment.
After hanging up with her I made an online payment to catch up the payment and we are looking into to refinancing at a REAL BANK. Be aware of these people. If you speak to one person and they tell you one thing apparently it doesn't matter and each individual can make their own rules and time limits. This Jeanie lady was extremely rude. I used to work in collections at a bank years ago and I NEVER spoke to customers the way she spoke to me. We were never allowed to raise our voice no matter how delinquent accounts were. I think VMF needs to re-train their employees or hire more professional ones.
0 comments