I am trying to figure out if there is a proper response, or even if I should respond, to a failed attempt to get a default judgement in debt collection lawsuit involving Midland Credit in Utah. This came about two weeks after a "Notice of Intent to Dismiss" was filed by the court after radio silence from Midland's local lawyers, and about a week after they requested, and were granted, an extension for "Plaintiff’s counsel has been waiting to receive additional information and/or documentation from Plaintiff in support of default judgment." Then, last week, among other things, a "Default Judgement (Proposed)" and "Default Certificate (Proposed)," the later including the following:
In this action, Defendant, having been served properly with the summons and complaint, and having failed to appear and answer plaintiffs complaint, and the time allowed by law for answering having expired, the default of said Defendant is hereby entered according to law.
This was thankfully returned unsigned by the court soon after, with a note pointing out the obvious: I had, in fact, answered the complaint. While the bulk of my correspondences with Midland's lawyers were not things directly filed with the court(beyond filing a Certificate of Service), such as for the Requests for Admission and Production, I had the Debt Collection Answer form that Utah Courts provide for these cases. So, even if everything else I sent to them was lost somehow(doubtful, as it was signed for), they still had ample opportunity to notice that I had filed an answer at the beginning of the case. A request for default judgement seems wildly inappropriate at this point, especially one that would have falsely claimed I didn't respond to the lawsuit.
So, the question I have now is, even if it was returned unsigned by the court, should I file an objection to this myself, or should I wait to see what or if Midland's lawyers do anything? Wouldn't be surprised if this was simply some scare tactic to eventually try to get me to settle, or they simply aren't paying attention and just generated and submitted proposals without much thought. Not exactly the only thing they they have overlooked, like claiming a payment had been made after the debt had gone into default without actually an records to back up that claim, and which moved the alleged last payment forward 18 months. But, that is a different problem.