I'm new to credit repair and have a few problems to clear up.

I do mean a few. I have a total of 10 negative items reported across all three credit reports. This means that I have 3 different items duplicated across the three reports and one item that shows up on two of them. Except for a cable bill I assert is in error (I'll post on that in a different thread...), all debts are actually paid in full.

Verizon Wireless "suspended" rather than closed an account on me in 2002, during my last bit of unemployment. Had they closed the account as requested and *actually*sent*a*bill* with my final balance they would have been paid, we would have parted company with no harm done and that would be just a bit of history.

Instead, Verizon fails to send a bill for 6 years.

In 2005, they write off the debt and post a charge-off to my credit history. A charge off? Bad but not the end of the world. The three or so old ones I have won't kill my credit score. Oh! But wait! One is never enough!

Verizon Wireless has posted TWENTY NINE charge-offs to my credit report for the same $275.00 debt over the past three years.

I go to get a mortgage and find their stinking turds in my credit report. They've been in there like a cat that prefers the potted plants to the litter box!

TWENTY NINE!

So...

My questions for the knowledgeable worthies here:
Am I mistaken in believing that a charge-off is like a mortgage foreclosure or a repo of a car or boat, in that it can only occur once for any given debt, just like you can only foreclose any given mortgage once or repo a car only once?

Does credit reporting follow GAAP?

I think this activity violates the FCRA like jerk with a pocket full of rufies on prom night. Do you think I've been violated? Like maybe 28 times?

Would you sue?

Thanks,
-S

Are they reporting 29 separate trade lines (not legal), or are they reporting it as a charge off month after month (likely Experian) - legal. They are confirming it is still a CO - not a new CO

It is a single tradeline.

This would mean that credit reporting practices don't follow GAAP.

In a prior life, I had a small business which I closed when the market turned. I had to know a bit of accounting and took a few classes to stay out of trouble with the IRS. My textbooks say that once a debt is charged off, it's written into the company's losses unless it's somehow recovered at a later date, when the monies received are then written to income. It's a special event that can occur only once for any given debt. You can't say that the same $300 is gone 12 times in one year, and post a $3600 loss. The IRS doesn't like that.

This is, for me, an odd occurrance. With the exception of that cable bill, all my debts are paid in full, including that Verizon turd. A few debts charged off in 2002 when I was unemployed for 8 months, but were paid in full within a year of getting the new job, with good faith payments arranged as soon as it was possible to make them. None of those debts show multiple charge-offs for the single tradeline; so it seems like a questionable practice on Verizon's part.

-S

Credit reporting is not accounting. No, GAAP does not apply.

If it's paid, it should show that it has a zero balance, though.

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The Answer is 42!!

It is paid. I have proof, proof and more proof.

When I sent payment, it was accompanied with a letter explaining the terms associated with accepting payment, and that included removing the charge-offs and updating the account to reflect a status of "Paid as agreed." I have notarized copies and the green card.

It was explained to me that each charge-off entry does count against your score and that there isn't consideration that there are multiple charge-offs in a single tradeline, just that there are multiple charge-offs.

Is this incorrect?

My lesson learned from this garbage is that organizations are incompetent and often criminally negligent, and that I will generate, demand and retain proof of my correct actions.

-S

A lender that was on the ball would see that it is the same thing over and over again.I don't know your fico score but with all those co's it must be under the scale they use.

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jjgross* The answer my friend is written on the wind

Try writing a letter to Verizon (I used the nutcase since mine was paid). They corrected all of the CO's on my report to "paid collection." I am not through with them since they didn't provide me with any proof of anything but at least all the CO's are gone.