Negotiate a settlement

Hi, I got my debts paid off this week. I'd been paying them for a year then I moved and never let the collection firm know and so I stopped paying. I'd been worrying about it ever since but the longer I left it the harder it was for me to contact them. I thought as soon as I let them know where I live they'd be around taking my belongings.

Then last week I got a letter from a different collection firm who had bought the debt - they obviously didn't find it hard to locate me. The debt was for £860 which to me is a lot of money considering it was only £300 to start with. After reading info on this site about negotiating a settlement I rang them up and said I would pay £300, they said they wanted 75%. We agreed on 50% to clear it. I'm so glad I got it sorted and I wanted to encourage others not to leave a debt and hope it will go away like I did - and also to ring the firm who will probably be willing to negotiate a settlement.