Never Let a Debt Go To Collection
The appearance of a collection account on your credit report can cause your credit score to tumble down into the depths. Unfortunately once this happens, just paying the balance on this will not increase your credit score. Records of collection accounts stay on your credit report and affect your overall score more than seven years. (More information on how to get around this is provided in Part IV. of this guide.)
One thing that you can try and negotiate before you negotiate to pay off a debt that is about to go to collection is the reporting of the debt to a bureau. Tell the lender that you will pay the debt in full provided the lapse of creditability is not reported to any of the many three credit bureaus. Sometimes the credit bureau is so desperate to collect or so sick of dealing with you that they will agree to do this.
In some cases you can even convince the lender to write the credit bureau for you and have the negative comment of the collection account removed from your credit score. If you manage to pull this off then your credit scores will increase exponentially!