Illinois Fair Debt Consumer Guide
Learn about your legal rights when facing Debt Collector Problems. Research the applicable laws that could help protect you when a debt collector is attempting to seize your assets, garnish your wages or continue collection of a debt that is outside Illinois' Statutes Of Limitations. Illinois phone recording laws could assist you in gathering proof of the debt collector's illegal tactics; find out whether recording your debt collector's phone conversation is permitted in your state.
The Illinois Fair Debt Collection Consumer Practices Guide summarizes Illinois' laws on wage garnishment, property and asset seizures and state statutes of limitations on debt collection and could provide the ammunition you need to stop or limit creditors and collectors from harassing you, garnishing your wages or bank accounts, and from seizing your property through liens, thus limiting your overall financial exposure.
This Guide does not include information concerning the FTC's Credit Practices Rule, state consumer protection laws or information regarding exemption provisions found in laws other than the state's general exemption laws and is not intended to substitute for the advice of an attorney.
Illinois Consumer Debt Exemption Laws
If a debt collector threatens to seize your property or your assets, you could be protected under Illinois’s Consumer Debt Exemption Laws. Read the summarized information below to learn how to protect what you own and what you cannot protect from seizure. You could significantly strengthen your bargaining position with debt collectors by knowing your rights under Illinois Debt Exemption Law!
Illinois Statutes
Illinois Code
The State of Illinois has opted out of federal bankruptcy exemptions. 735 Illinois Statutes Annotated § 5/12-1201.
Wages: 735 Illinois Statutes Annotated § 5112-803 and .813; 740 TIL Statute Annotated § 170/4.
Homestead: 735 Illinois Statutes Annotated §§ 5112·901, ·902, ·903.5 and ·906.
Tangible personal property: 625 Illinois Statutes § 45/3A.7; 735 III. Statute § 5/12-1001.
Benefits, retirement plans, insurance, judgments, and other intangibles:
735 Illinois Statutes Annotated §§ 5112-1001, and -1006. See 820 Illinois
Statutes Annotated § 405/1300.
Illinois Debt Statutes of Limitation
Your debt may have expired under Illinois’s Statutes of Limitations, and may be considered uncollectible. Read the summary below to see the length of time certain types of debt can continue to be collected under the Illinois Debt Statutes of Limitations, don’t let a collector threaten to take you to court over an expired debt.
Illinois Debt Statutes of Limitation
Breach of contract for sale under the UCC: 4 years.
Open account or unwritten contract: 5 years. NOTE: Except, as provided in 810 ILCS 5/2- 725 (UCC), actions based on a written contract must be filed within 10 years, but if a payment or new written promise to pay is in made during the 10 year period, then the action may be commenced within 10 years after the date of the payment or promise to pay.
Domestic judgments: 20 years, but can be renewed during that 20-year period.
Foreign judgments are the same time as allowed by the laws of the foreign jurisdiction.
Tolling: A person's absence from the state or during the time that an action is stayed by injunction, court order or by statutory prohibition tolls the time limit.
Non Sufficient Funds (NSF or Payment of Negotiable Instruments) checks: 3 years of the dishonor of the draft or 10 years after the date of the draft, whichever expired first: 810 ILCS 5/3-118
Illinois Wage Garnishment Procedural Requirements
Wage garnishment doesn’t mean a debt collector or creditor is entitled to take all your money. Under Illinois’s Wage Garnishment Laws, there are limits and protections on just how much can be taken from your paycheck.
Read the summary below to learn your garnishment rights under Illinois law.
Illinois Wage Garnishment Procedural Requirements
Illinois Procedural Requirements
Upon the filing by a judgment creditor of an affidavit that the applicant believes any person is indebted to the judgment debtor, other than for wages, and includes the last address of the judgment debtor known to the affiant as well as the name of the judgment debtor, the garnishment notice required by _ 12705 and written interrogatories to be answered by the garnishee with respect to the indebtedness, the clerk of the court in which the judgment was entered shall issue summons against the person named in the affidavit commanding him or her to appear in the court as garnishee and answer the interrogatories in writing under oath. The interrogatories shall require that the garnishee certify that a copy of the completed interrogatories has been mailed to the judgment debtor and shall be in a form consistent with local court rules. 735 ILCS _ 5/12701.
Summons with four copies of the interrogatories shall be served and returned as in other civil cases. The summons shall be accompanied by a copy of the underlying judgment or a certification by the clerk of the court that entered the judgment, or by the attorney for the judgment creditor, setting forth the amount of the judgment, the name of the court and the number of the case and one copy of a garnishment notice. 735 ILCS _ 5/12705.
To the extent of the amount due upon the judgment and costs, the garnishee shall hold, subject to the order of the court any nonexempt indebtedness or other nonexempt property in his or her possession, custody or control belonging to the judgment debtor or in which the judgment debtor has any interest. The judgment or balance due thereon becomes a lien on the indebtedness and other property held by the garnishee at the time of the service of garnishment summons and remains a lien thereon pending the garnishment proceeding. The garnishee shall file a written answer under oath to the interrogatories, setting forth as of the date of service of the garnishment summons any indebtedness due or to become due to the judgment debtor and any other property in his, her or its possession, custody or control belonging to the judgment debtor or in which the judgment debtor has an interest. The garnishee shall mail, by first class mail, a copy of the answer to the judgment creditor and to the judgment debtor at the addresses specified in the affidavit or at any other address or location of the judgment debtor known to the garnishee, and shall certify in the answer that it was so mailed. 735 ILCS _ 5/12707.
No fee shall be paid by a garnishee for filing an appearance, answer or satisfaction of judgment against him or her. No fee shall be paid to a garnishee unless he or she is subpoenaed to appear as a witness, in which case he or she is entitled to witness fees as in other civil cases. Costs of obtaining the garnishment order are to be charged to the judgment debtor unless the court determines that the costs incurred by the judgment creditor were improperly incurred, in which case the costs are to be paid by the judgment creditor. 735 ILCS _ 5/12716.
Interest Rate at which Judgments Accrue Judgments recovered in any court shall draw interest at the rate of 9% per annum from date of the judgment until satisfied or 6% per annum when the judgment debtor is a unit of local government, a school district, a community college district, or any other governmental entity. When judgment is entered upon any award, report or verdict, interest shall be computed at the above rate, from the time when made or rendered to the time of entering judgment, and included in the judgment. 735 ILCS _ 5/21303. Applicable Forms Garnishment notice, 735 ILCS 5/12705.
Illinois (Debt Collector) Call Recording Law
Under Illinois State and Federal Call Recording Laws, you could record the actual phone conversation with a debt collector in your efforts to stop debt collectors from calling! Illinois is a two party consent state, meaning you need the permission of all parties that are on the call to record the conversation. Thus you DO need a debt collector’s permission before you can record your phone conversation with him (or her) in the state of Illinois.
Research and find additional information about Federal Call Recording Laws and learn what call recording procedures are legal in other states.
