How to Know When Your Garnishment Has Been Paid in Full

A garnishment is a legal process that gives a debt collector the right to take your property to fulfill a debt obligation. The most common form of garnishment includes wage or bank account garnishments. A wage garnishment requires your employer to withhold a portion of your earnings each pay period to satisfy the garnishment. A bank account garnishment requires your bank to send monies deposited into your bank account to the debt collector until the garnishment is released. You can take certain actions to determine if your garnishment is paid off.

Instructions

1. Ask your employer for a record of your garnishment payments. Most employers use payroll software, which stores employee payroll deductions including garnishment payments. Your employer can give you a printout of all the payments you have made so far. Subtract your total payments from what you owe to see if it's paid off.

2. Contact the creditor or agency that initiated the garnishment for your balance. The entity collecting the payments, such as your bank or employer, is supposed to send the payments to the party indicated on the garnishment notice. In most cases, this "party" is whoever initiated the garnishment against you; they can tell you the amount of payments they have received thus far and what you still owe.

3. Check your pay stub for your garnishment deductions. Most employers include current and year-to-date garnishment deductions on employee pay stubs. Subtract the year-to-date amount from what you owe to see if the garnishment is paid off. If you do not have YTD data on your pay stub, add up all your current payments thus far to see if it amounts to what you owe.

Tips & Warnings

• In many cases, the issuing agency sends the garnishee notification to release the garnishment once it has been paid in full. If your employer is still withholding from your paychecks even though the debt has been paid off, it's probably because it has not received a release letter from the agency. Contact the agency promptly if this is the case so you can be reimbursed for any improperly garnished amounts. In some cases, the employer is solely responsible for stopping the garnishment once it has been fulfilled (the agency does not send a release letter).

• Creditors must file and win a lawsuit against you then obtain a garnishment from the court in order to garnish your property; contact the issuing court for help with these types of garnishments.

• Legal entities, such as the state revenue agency and the IRS do not need a court order to garnish; consult these agencies directly for assistance with these types of garnishments.

References

• North Carolina Department of Revenue
• The Free Dictionary: Garnishment