Should i pay a collection agency on my husbands unpaid pay day loan

        My ex owes my $3360 as of the 1st of Dec.  We have a
hearing the 26th of Nov.  If I get that money I would
first pay off the pay day loans.  Should I pay the next bills that are in collections or the ones still with the creditor?
I’ve been told before to never give money to a collection agency, wait till they go back to the creditor.  Anyone heard of this?

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Make sure that you pay any debts that are current.  You certainly do not
want to cause them to go delinquent and end up on your credit report.

With what you have left, you can pay off debts in collection, but keep a
few things in mind.  Many original creditors will not even talk to you
once the debt has been sent to a collection agency.  You can certainly
try to talk to them, but they may not be as willing to settle for less
then a collection agency.

And if the purpose of this is to clean up your credit report, keep in
mind that paying a delinquent debt does NOT remove the negative
information from your credit report.  They will show it is  “paid” but
all of the negative info about collections and late payments will still
be there.  So try to negotiate something with them first demanding that
in exchange for payment they must delete all negative info from your
credit report.  Otherwise I would not pay them.

Also note that if this debt has already been on your credit report for a
few years, paying it off can actually hurt your credit scores worse, as
it now becomes an active account.  The older the debts the less they
hurt your score.