To cancel Credit Associates, send a written cancellation notice to the company, stop the automatic payments coming out of your bank account, and contact the third-party bank holding your dedicated savings account to get your funds returned. Federal law requires that money to come back to you within seven business days of your request, minus only fees the company legitimately earned on debts it already settled. The order of those steps matters, and so does the paperwork.
Get Your Account Details Together First
Before you call or write anyone, pull your original Debt Settlement Agreement. It has your account number and the cancellation terms. If the paper copy is gone, log into your online dashboard and download it.
Identify the third-party bank holding your dedicated savings account. It’s often Global Client Solutions or a similar custodian, and you’ll contact them separately from Credit Associates to recover your money.
Credit Associates lists the following contacts for current clients:1Credit Associates. Get Debt Help Today
- Phone: 1-800-348-7606
- Email: accountsupport@creditassociates.com
- Fax: 1-877-316-4615
Write down your next scheduled payment date. You’ll need to time the stop-payment order at your bank around it. Miss that window by a day and another withdrawal goes through.
Send a Written Cancellation Notice
A phone call starts the conversation. A written notice is what protects you if Credit Associates later claims they never heard from you. Send a letter through USPS certified mail with return receipt requested. The green card that comes back with a signature is your proof of delivery.
Keep the letter short. Include your full name, account number, a clear statement that you are terminating the service agreement, and a request for written confirmation that no further fees will be charged. You’re not negotiating; you’re ending a contract.
Send a copy by email to accountsupport@creditassociates.com the same day so there’s a digital timestamp behind the mailed version. If the company offers cancellation through its online portal, use that too and screenshot every confirmation screen. Overdocumenting costs you nothing.
Stop the Automatic Payments at Your Bank
Sending a cancellation letter does not stop money from leaving your checking account. The ACH authorization you signed at enrollment keeps pulling payments until you revoke it separately. Under the Electronic Fund Transfer Act, you have the right to stop any preauthorized transfer by notifying your bank orally or in writing at least three business days before the next scheduled withdrawal.2Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 15 USC 1693e – Preauthorized Transfers
Call your bank and request a stop-payment on the recurring ACH debit. Follow up in writing, because under Regulation E the bank can require written confirmation within fourteen days of your oral request.3eCFR. 12 CFR 1005.10 – Preauthorized Transfers
Banks typically charge a stop-payment fee, often around $25 to $35. That’s cheap compared to losing another month’s deposit into a program you’re leaving. Do this the same day you mail your cancellation letter.
Recover Your Dedicated Account Funds
This is where people leave money on the table by not knowing the rule. The money in your dedicated savings account belongs to you, not Credit Associates. The Telemarketing Sales Rule requires the account to be held at an insured financial institution independent of the debt relief company, and you can withdraw at any time without penalty. Once you ask for your funds, the custodial bank has seven business days to return them, minus only fees legitimately earned on debts that were already successfully settled.4eCFR. 16 CFR 310.4 – Abusive Telemarketing Acts or Practices
“Legitimately earned” is the operative phrase. Under the same rule, a debt settlement company cannot charge a fee on a debt until it has actually been settled and you’ve agreed to the settlement terms. If Credit Associates hasn’t resolved a particular debt, it hasn’t earned a fee on that debt.5Federal Trade Commission. Debt Relief Services and the Telemarketing Sales Rule – A Guide for Business
Contact the custodial bank directly using the account information from your agreement. Ask for the current balance, an itemized breakdown of any fees that have been deducted, and the refund method. Most process returns by mailed check or electronic transfer.
If Credit Associates Won’t Cooperate
Most cancellations go through. If yours doesn’t, if the company delays your refund, refuses to confirm cancellation, or continues charging fees, you have real leverage. The FTC enforces the Telemarketing Sales Rule, and violations carry substantial civil penalties per occurrence.6Federal Trade Commission. FTC Publishes Inflation-Adjusted Civil Penalty Amounts for 2025
File a complaint with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau at consumerfinance.gov/complaint. The CFPB forwards it directly to the company, which generally must respond within 15 days. You’ll be notified when they do and have 60 days to respond.7Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Learn How the Complaint Process Works
You can also file with the FTC at reportfraud.ftc.gov. Referencing these enforcement channels in your cancellation letter tends to accelerate cooperation.
What Happens to the Debts That Weren’t Settled
Canceling does not make your remaining debts disappear. Any account that wasn’t settled is still outstanding, likely with added interest and late fees from the months you weren’t paying it. This is the part of cancellation people underestimate.
While you were enrolled, Credit Associates probably told you to stop paying creditors directly. That strategy creates negotiating leverage, but it also means your accounts have been delinquent, sometimes for many months. Once you leave, creditors who were waiting for a settlement offer may resume collection. Some may file lawsuits, especially on larger balances. The statute of limitations varies by state and generally continues to run during enrollment, so the clock hasn’t paused for you.
With the funds returned from your dedicated account, you have options. You can contact creditors directly. Many card issuers run internal hardship programs with reduced interest rates or modified payment plans, and you don’t need a middleman to access them. You can negotiate your own lump-sum settlements, and without a company taking a percentage, the cash goes further. Nonprofit credit counselors affiliated with the National Foundation for Credit Counseling offer free or low-cost debt management plans. For debts that are genuinely unmanageable, a bankruptcy consultation may be more useful than continued negotiation.
Taxes on Debts Already Settled
If Credit Associates settled one or more debts before you canceled, you may owe taxes on the forgiven portion. Creditors are required to file Form 1099-C with the IRS when they cancel $600 or more of a debt, and the IRS treats that forgiven amount as taxable income. If you owed $10,000 on a card and it was settled for $6,000, the remaining $4,000 can show up on your return as income.
There’s an exception that catches many people off guard. If you were insolvent at the time a debt was canceled, meaning your total liabilities exceeded the fair market value of your assets, you can exclude some or all of the forgiven debt from your income. The exclusion is capped at the amount by which you were insolvent.8Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 26 USC 108 – Income From Discharge of Indebtedness
To claim it, file IRS Form 982 with your return for the year the debt was discharged. You’ll need to total your assets and liabilities as of the moment immediately before the cancellation.9Internal Revenue Service. Instructions for Form 982
If multiple debts were enrolled and only some settled before you canceled, track each one separately. Creditors are required to send Form 1099-C in early February of the following tax year, so keep your settlement paperwork.
The Credit Damage Doesn’t Reverse
Canceling the program doesn’t undo the credit damage from enrollment. The missed payments that accumulated while Credit Associates was negotiating are already on your reports, and they stay there for seven years from the date each payment was missed. Payment history is the largest factor in credit scoring, so these marks carry weight.
Settled accounts appear as “settled for less than the full amount.” Better than an unpaid collection, worse than “paid in full.” These notations remain for seven years from the original delinquency date.
Going forward, make on-time payments on any remaining accounts, keep credit utilization low, and avoid opening unnecessary new accounts. Consistent positive behavior starts to offset the older damage within a year or two. Disputing any inaccurate late-payment entries through the credit bureaus is worth doing; errors in this space are more common than most people expect.