The answer is yes and no.  Yes, a creditor can garnish your paycheck but only after they have gone through the necessary legal steps to do so. 

Here is the process a creditor must go through to garnish your wages.  First, the creditor must file a lawsuit against you.  You then have to be served with the lawsuit and you will at that time be able to defend yourself.  If you lose, either after you defend yourself or just don’t file an answer, the creditor will ask the Court and receive a judgment against you.  After the creditor has received the judgment he can petition the Court for a writ of garnishment of your paycheck. The Court generally signs this writ (another word for an Order) when the creditor files it. The Writ of Garnishment is then sent to your employer (and the creditor may or may not know who the employer is).

When the employer gets the writ of garnishment, they are bound by the Court’s Order to withhold money from your paycheck and send it to the creditor. Nevada law protects 75% of your wages in order to leave you enough money for the necessities of life, but needless to say you will be left with very little to survive.

In the end, the wage garnishment process can take months to pan out.  Thus, if a creditor/collection agency has told you that they will garnish if you don’t pay today, and you haven’t been served with a lawsuit/there is no judgment existing, then you may have an excellent case to sue the creditor for violations of your state and/or federal debt collection laws.

If however a creditor has gone through the necessary steps and properly obtained a wage garnishment order all is not lost.  Bankruptcy will immediately stop all wage garnishment orders and allow you a fresh start.  So, if you are served with a wage garnishment I highly recommend you seek.

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