You contact, unfortunately, may be right. There are two ways to buy a company. The first is to buy the corporate (or LLC) entity--the "company," if you would. If that is what happens, then the new owner is responsible for the bills, since he, she, or it now owns the same legal person or entity which incurred the obligation.The other way is to simply buy the assets of the old company--i.e. the customer files, the inventory, the equipment, etc. Buying assets does not obligate one to the bills of the old. In this case, unless you can prove some sort of wrongdoing (e.g. it was "sold" to the same person, specifically to defraud creditors), you can't collect from the buying company, though you may still be able to seek payment from the old company (if it still exists, even as a relatively inactive "shell" but one with assets you could reach) or potentially from the old owners (if the company had been a sole proprietorship or partnership, so owners were personally liable, and not an LLC or corporation).