No Communication- Just handed over

I'm highly upset with ABSA Homeloans. Like many other people, our finances hit a snag towards the end of last year and we struggled to pay all our bills. I made payments on my home loan every month, but there were times we had to choose between eating and paying our home loan. Every time the collections department phoned, I explained the situation. We got behind with our account, and I was busy discussing the situation and making payment arrangements with one of the ABSA employees. I have a pecu**** situation, and was explaining this (on email) to the agent. The last communication was from my side. I heard nothing further from this person. Without ANY further communication from ABSA, we were notified that our account had been handed over to attorneys. Needless to say, by the end of this month, our account will be caught up, as I was explaining to the collections department. I feel like it's terrible service from the ABSA collections department to simply hand us over to attorneys WHILE I'm making arrangements to pay the arrears amount. I completely understand if I wasn't cooperative, or was refusing to pay. But I was trying to communicate and come up with a plan that will work. This is unacceptable.