Hey all, I've read through these forums a little bit and have come to the conclusion that this is the place to be when it comes to seeking advice on fixing your score. Anyway, I have two bad marks on my credit (both are in collections, so it's really bad) and I currently have the money to pay both off. They went into collections when I was young and stupid and I did the "if I ignore it, it will go away" routine. Well, now I'm older and I want to get married without bringing a horrible credit score (around 600) into the marriage. My question for you guys is what is the procedure for getting these marks removed? I saw something about NDA's and then disputing, but I have no idea how to go about doing this. Also, one of my collection accounts is a judgement and I know that this is REALLY bad. Looking forward to your responses, thanks guys. - biohaza12d
Correction, the account isn't a judgement. I checked my scores and they are all reporting "in collections" for both accounts. Here's hoping that this is better for me. They are both owned by the same CA as well "portfolio recovery associates llc"
One account is 4 years old and the other is 5 years old. DOFD for both is January of 2012 and my states SOL is 4 years.
Both of the OC accounts report "charged-off" and the CA is currently reporting "in collections". I'm not sure if that means both but the OC reports are older Thanks very much for your replys, BTW, it's appreciated
I'm not 100% sure as it's showing a "-" on the balance. I'm assuming that means 0 but I uploaded a photo to show you what I mean. hxxp://i1353.photobucket.com/albums/q663/biohaza12d1/Mobile%20Uploads/IMG_20140304_134609_zps227838a2.jpg
Okay, sorry to keep follow-up posting but I went ahead and got a full credit report from all three agencies instead of using creditkarma, etc., for my information. Not sure if it makes a huge difference but the date of last payment on my first account is 11/11 and on my second it's 09/11. And I can also now verify 100% that the accounts now belong to the CA and not the OC. The OC sold them to the CA.
Yes, it does make a difference (getting your actual reports), and I should have asked that earlier on -- whether you pulled 3 hard copies of your reports, no tri-merged or credit karma or smart credit-- etc, for YOUR purposes, does not work. Those are good for monitoring, but don't put any stock in the scores they give you. DOFD is 10/11 and 12/11, which puts you 2 years 3 and 5 months into the SOL. So, like we talked about before, you're still well within the 4YR time frame for your states SOL, and unfortunately this makes it tougher to negotiate, but that doesn't mean all is lost. The other not so good news is that the debt is sold, and what it sounds like is you have 4 negative TL's reporting from these 2 accounts. It's always harder to work on an OC trade line, but when it's assigned there is at least the chance to have the OC "call off" the CA and settle with the OC directly. In your case, I don't think you'll be able to work with the them as far as a PFD....so, you'll need to look for reporting errors. Are the CA accounts reporting any differently from the OC? Has the CA ever contacted you by phone or in writing? If so, did you respond to their (dunning) letter? Do you have old statements from the account? Anything to prove they are reporting incorrectly? The key here is to find something about the account that is being reported incorrectly and dispute based on that. Depending on the CA, you may be able to negotiate a PFD, but you may have to start around 40% or higher settlement considering the account is not that old.
