I was away for almost 2 months. I had a bill which arrived at my home shortly after I left on the 20. of may and I only payed it last tuesday when I came home. 2 days later I got a letter from some Debitor Company which states that FedEx (the bill I had to pay) redirected it to them to get the money and that I now need to pay on top of the 29.50 almost a hundred swiss francs for some fees they raised. Since I payed the bill before this letter arrived do I need to pay it? Thanks for your help 🙂

I mean I do get if I have to pay it I just want to be sure that i‘m not paying something I don‘t have to. But of course it was my responsibility to pay the bill.

31 comments

  1. In your case, I would first contact them by phone and demand an adjustment of the invoice, if this does not work, send a registered letter. For example, interest charges are not allowed by the debt collection office. The processing and collection costs are also not legally binding. Tell them to call the ombudsman and the legal protection, offer them to pay the actual amount of the bill.

  2. Oh my god, this Fedex crap 😀 I had similar, except I paid before (it took the original letter 4 weeks to deliver, and it was already way past due).

    I paid. Then I got another letter that I should pay (which took also 4 weeks). I opened a ticket for FedEx in their system for this.

    What happened? I got a letter again, that I should pay! Same, 4 weeks later than the absendungs datum.

    I did not receive more after, but Fedex has a really crappy service. I just try to by the stuff now abroad, or order to family there.

  3. I had to deal once with this kind of sharks, but the letter came the day after I made the payment. I just sent a mail to the dude listed on it telling him that I already paid the bill to its rightful owner. He replied that he’ll check with fedex and nothing since.

    I think I would play dumb on this one. Pay the original fedex bill and write the guy a mail telling you’re just coming back and already paid while sorting your mail out before falling on their letter.

    This is not legal advice though!

  6. ex-FDX employee here….

    Either call FDX up and request the original invoice if you dont have it/never received it.
    Or send an email to switzerland@fedex.com with the payment confirmation of your bank, they will have to open a case to get the debitors letter deleted and you won’t receive a “Betreibung”.

    They have huuuuuuge issues with sending invoices on time because they are cheap and can’t be bothered to do anything right.

    Shameful company, sorry this happend to you

  7. Dont pay it. Even the sentence: do you realy wana risk it
    Is the factor to not pay it. Pay original bill and thats it

  10. No don’t pay ! They a NO legal base. Plus they are simple letter which means there is NO proof of delivery :

    Now the interest is even lower is 4%

    That was my answer if you want a template :

    I have received your simple letter dated 10.03.2020.
    I must admit that I do not understand your letter for several reasons.

    I received an invoice in German from FedEx, not understanding it (I do not speak German) I contacted them to have a clarification which was given to me and the invoice was paid by my person. I have not received any reminder letter from them except for your letter of today which asks for absolutely abusive collection fees (almost mafia-like).

    Since you seem to appreciate the law, I refer you to the following article which, if applicable, limits the interest on arrears to 5% (and not more than 270%).

    https://www.admin.ch/gov/fr/accueil/documentation/communiques.msg-id-84181.html

    Finally, I remind you that I have not received any reminder letter, either simple or with acknowledgement of receipt. In accordance with article 103 you will allow me to avoid the responsibility that you impute to me not being able to provide evidence of a fault on my part.

    I would allow myself to file a complaint for harassment if you were to contact me about this abusive claim.

  12. No!!!!! Tell them very harshly, firmly, without holding back to literally fuck off.

    Yes, do use those words, and be as rude as possible.

    Their fees and charges have no legal basis, remind them of that after telling them to fuck off. I’ve dealt with this exact company twice and both times they left me alone after I told them to stick it where the sun don’t shine. They will not put you in poursuite because they know very well that they don’t have a legal basis for their fees.

    Pay the original debt to the original company you owed it to. Even if they tell you not to. They will simply forward the payment to Debitors Management (or refuse it, in which case you can tell them “why aren’t you accepting me payment, don’t you want it anymore? I have never made a contract with or purchased anything from Debitors Management and refuse to make any payment to them”.

    Do not pay anything to these absolute degenerate fucks. They are the lowest of the low. Praying on people with money issues and/or lack of knowledge about the law.

    And yeah, my protection juridique insurance has confirmed all this to me. The only fee that is justified is the 5% intérêt moratoire. But you can pay the original debt to FedEx and if they want their 20cts they can ask you for it themselves.

    You have no requirement to even reply to Debitors Management. Ignoring them is a perfectly viable option as long as you pay FedEx. They will keep sending you very threatening letters for a few months, but nothing will ever happen.

    It can leave a bad record at CRIF credit database. But you can contact CRIF and erase it by explaining. This is only a problem if you’re looking to take out a loan. I prefer to warn you of this, but the ZEK credit database is the more important one anyway, which it does not impact I think.

  13. Is that a fine you got for posting pictures rotated 90° to the left? 🙂

    In general if you paid the original bill before it’s due date you can call them, send them proof of payment and it’s all done. If not, call them anyway to help clear things up. Whoever billed you originally sent the information to a debt collector, which they can do, pay the original bill plus due fees and it’s settled. If you are away for more than a month it’s on you to see to it that outstanding bills get paid.

  14. FedEx are complete psychos. UPS aren’t much better. I got a bill from them without any kind of indication whatsoever what it was for. I tried to call them for days but never got through to anyone 5 days after the initial bill arrived, I got a “Mahnung” with “Inkassodrohung” because the bill was overdue for 13 days (as they claimed). I’ve now forwarded the issue to my legal insurance. They advised me not to pay anything before I have received an itemized bill.

  15. FedEx, honestly, is a huge bunch of twats.

    Last time they delivered something, they just straight up forgot to send me an invoice, but still decided it was a wise decision to try and pull this same crap.
    Told them I never received an invoice and they felt like I was still obliged to pay the whole sum. Proceeded to pay the original invoice and told them so by e-mail. Never heard back.

  17. So I had the exact same issue with going on holiday, getting a package delivered by FedEx, being late and then getting a letter just like yours, from the same company… only in French.

    As many others here have already pointed out. Don’t pay a single cent over what you legally owe. You owe the 5# annual interest and the original fee. Pay that and nothing more. All the other things have zero legal basis. Expect them to harass you about it. Don’t bulge. I am lucky to have a couple of friends who are practicing lawyers who confirmed it for me.

    You were late in paying. Hence why you owe the initial sum and the 0.20 interest. That’s all that is required by law. The rest is BS. They will try to argue that legally you are responsible for additional costs incurred by your late payment. This is true, but you need to be able to prove that by paying late, you set in motion a series of events which resulted in those additional costs. Think about it, no one forced the company to reach out to a debt collection agency. That’s their thing. FedEx didn’t go bankrupt because of your late payment. There is no pre-defined contact that specifies any late fee. No one forced FedEx to transfer the debt to this company. If they had done a “mise en poursuite”, which is asking the state to take a legal procedure to recover your money – sorry I don’t know the term in German – then there would be an additional cost that’s scaled relative to the debt and far less than the amount this company is asking for.

    Pay what you owe: the initial debt and the 5% interest (-.20 lol) and nothing more. They will keep sending you letters, that are progressively nastier. Don’t let yourself be intimated. They will threaten to do a “mise en poursuite” but never will. Why? Because they have no legal basis. Then time will pass. And they’ll start sending you letters again six months later, in the hope that you will have forgotten. The most hilarious letter I got was a few months ago when they kindly offered me a 30% “discount” on the so-called debt if I paid within the next ten days.

    These people are clowns and scumbags. I find it particularly distasteful because they make their money off of of lazy or vulnerable people that don’t know their rights and can easily be intimated. It’s disgusting, praying on the vulnerable like that.

    Eventually they will stop. Or keep trying sporadically, and you can laugh at their attempts, confident in the knowledge that if you really did owe something, they would have taken legal action and a judge would have ordered you to pay by now.

    If you really want them to stop writing to you and have a friend that’s a lawyer, you can ask them to write a strongly worded to tell them to fuck off.

  18. Ask a justification for the cost, they have to legally give it to you. Most of the time they can’t justify it because it’s bullshit

  22. You are only ever required to pay the original business, these are the people who you owe money. They are allowed to charge you a late payment fee (within reason), this you also have to pay. But every markup that comes from a debitor company is pure bs and you have no legal obligation to pay them a dime.

    So just pay the original amount (plus late payment fees if the original business charged you any) and tell that debitor company to gtfo.

  24. Don’t bother. Send an email if you want but also ok to not react at all. I went all the way with a similar scammy thing once. In the worst case they will send you a payment order “Betreibung” but very important that you challenge it “Rechtsvorschlag” right away. That means that they would have to take legal action to prove that you owe the money, which they can’t and won’t as it is as scam and not worth it for them. After 3 months of them not taking action you can delete the entry in the registry for 40.- and the whole thing is history.

  25. Had the same thing.

    Didnt pay cause f### them.

    Heard a year every second month from them with a letter „pay or go to jail“, „pay or betribung“.

    Oneday they stopped.

    Could bomb them 🙂

  27. Honestly i would pay it cause you can get a lot of trouble by not paying it in time and you get this letter mostly if you dont pay a bil over a couple of months. And honestly the trouble in the future is not worth it

  28. Mandatory disclaimer: I am not lawyer. I don’t speak German but I’ve seen a few letters like this in the past. By law, you are liable for:

    1. The original bill.
    2. The moratory interest rate (standard is 5% *yearly* but may be contractually agreed to be something else).
    3. Damages according to Art. 106 OB.
    4. The 70CHF it takes to file against you in the office the

    However, and that’s very important to note, damages according to Art. 106 OB *DO NOT* include expenses incurred by creditors who prefer to be represented by lawyers/companies/other persons, and you should never pay fees that aren’t justified either by a contractual clause you’ve signed, or by a proof of damages.

  29. As far as I know you have to pay the original bill and also the delayed fees, but you dont have to pay the inkassobüro fees. If you have Rechtsschutz, have them look at it. The inkasdobüros are bullies, dont let them get away with it.
    And as for the 5% interest, I would check the AGBs, because unless tgey declared those there that’s just not allowed.

    Check this, hope it helps

    https://www.srf.ch/sendungen/kassensturz-espresso/post-vom-inkassobuero-das-sind-ihre-rechte

  30. I wrote a [comment on such matters](https://www.reddit.com/r/Switzerland/comments/xj7p5f/comment/ip77s97/) a couple of months ago in regards to “Intrum” inkasso. In your case you deal with a different company “Debitors Management”, but everything mentioned in that comment still applies to your case.

    As mentioned there and in some comments in this post, you only need to pay the original invoice amount (29.40) plus the 5% interest (0.20). Everything else is from a legal perspective not owed.

    I therefore recommend that you pay 29.60 and clearly indicate in the payment comments (to be sure put it into all the comment fields, as some of those are only visible to you) that this payment is for the “29.40 für Rechnung Nr. 225516863 vom 20.03.2023 + 0.20 für 5% Zinsen seit dem 20.03.2023 = TOTAL 29.60”. Otherwise (if you don’t specify what exactly the payment is for) they could claim that they regard this as a partial payment of the other (legally not-owed) costs.

    If you want to be really picky about it, then one would have to check whether the “5.00% Zinsen seit dem 20.03.2023” is actually legally correct. If the original invoice did grant/specify a due date / payment period (e.g. “due 30 days after the 20.03.2023”), then in my opinion they can only ask for interest from the point where the invoice was actually overdue, which would be a bit later than the 20.03.2023. But as it’s just 0.20 CHF, i don’t think it’s not really worth the hassle.

    Edit: I just saw that you already paid the 29.40. So the only thing legally owed is the interest. And the interest calculation gets even more complicated, as the interest owed starts when the payment became overdue (see above) and of course ends when you paid the original 29.40. You can also pay the interest (0.20 as demanded or 0.xx if you do your own calculation) directly to FedEx and just tell the inkasso company the debt has been fully settled (by paying 29.40 original invoice + 0.xx interest legally owed) and that you dispute all of the additional charges as they are legally not owed.

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