As I posted a couple days ago, after 5+ years of good behavior, my credit is good but not great, and a few points shy of where I need to be to get the mortgage I need for the house I want. I've pulled my TU and EQ scores from myFICO and have 710/720, respectively, with two negative tradelines; my hope is that getting one of them removed might goose my score the few points I need. One of the tradelines is a 120 day delinquency on a student loan, which I brought current once I found out about it (in 2007) and have been paying on time ever since. It's still over $5k, which I could pay off but not without eating into planned down payment money. My hope is that they'll be receptive to a goodwill letter, but somehow I can't believe that these actually work. The second tradeline is an old credit card that I fell severely behind on while in grad school, mostly paid off, moved overseas, didn't realize was still outstanding, and paid off when I moved back. It shows up as follows: Capital One: Status as of Aug, 2007 Date opened Jun, 2005 Date of last activity May, 2007 Date closed May, 2007 Loan type Credit Card Credit limit $500 Largest past balance $759 Descriptions Account closed by credit grantor Balance $0 Current Status "Payment after charge off/collection" (TU) / "Bad debt/collection" (EQ) Here's where it gets interesting: myFICO lists the following on the Equifax report: Seven year payment history 30 days late 2 times (Nov 2006, Jul 2006) 60 days late 2 times (Dec 2006, Aug 2006) 90+ days late 3 times (Mar 2007, Feb 2007, Jan 2007) On the TransUnion report, it shows up as clean: 30 days late 0 times 60 days late 0 times 90+ days late 0 times Worst Delinquency: None Reported Interestingly, myFICO doesn't give an account number for this card either on TU or EQ. So my question is: if I write a Not Mine letter, is there any risk that they'll investigate, verify the account, and somehow make things worse (say, by updating the TU score with late payment information)? Or is this pretty much a harmless first step? Is it a better option to try to make something out of the discrepancy between the two reports? Any thoughts on the above plan? Thanks!
From what I'm seeing, it shows up as a "Negative Indicator" (it has a little red flag next to it in the list of accounts). I believe that means adverse.
May as well post this here while I'm at it: was planning on sending AES the following: ******** February XX, 2013 James L. Preston President and Chief Executive Officer Pennsylvania Higher Education Assistance Agency American Education Services 1200 North Seventh Street Harrisburg, PA 17102-1444 Re: AES Account No. XXXXXXXXXX Dear Mr. Preston: I am writing as something of a last resort, in the hope that you might be able to grant a favor. American Education Services very generously extended a loan to me when I was finishing a Master’s degree in 2003, after my family’s financial situation deteriorated and I realized at the last minute that I was going to be unable to pay my tuition bill in cash. I’m now hoping against hope that you might be able to help me again in a very different context. Several years after AES disbursed that loan, I graduated from law school and moved to London for work, after which my student loans came out of deferment. I began to repay most of my student loans as scheduled, but unfortunately, due to my own lack of organization, I had lost track of the loan from AES and failed to start repaying your loan when it came due. To make matters worse, as I’d changed my phone number, address and email address when I moved overseas, AES was unable to contact me despite what I understand were several efforts. Six months later, in spring of 2007, I moved back to New York, pulled my credit report, found that I was severely late on a student loan account, called AES, paid the past-due amount, and enrolled in auto-pay to ensure that I would never be late again for so trivial a reason. I have to thank you for how well your customer service personnel were able to deal with my unique situation back then, and my experiences with AES since then have been exemplary. Fortunately, I’ve had no other credit issues since 2007, with you or any other creditor. My wife and I are now looking to buy a house, and unfortunately it appears that the past due payment from 2007 still has a significant impact on my credit score, enough to make critical differences in the financing available to us. As such, I’m writing to you to ask if you would consider a goodwill adjustment and allow the negative tradeline to come off of my credit reports ahead of schedule. A customer service representative told me that you typically don’t make adjustments to accurate late payment reports, but I’m hoping that you might make an exception in this one instance after six years of on-time payments. In short, I’m asking for clemency and forgiveness of a long-ago mistake. Please let me know if there’s anything I might be able to provide, in terms of documentation or further information, that would help you in your decision. And thank you so much for your consideration. Yours sincerely, cjd260 ******** Would appreciate any feedback!
Interesting coincidence what you brought up with what I stumbled upon last night....I found an old TU report from over 5 years ago. On it was an account that since has been deleted, however back then, in the months where payment was late, instead of a 30 (or 60, 90, etc) there was an X -- which according to their legend, meant unknown. No where on the account did it say it was ever late/delinquent, or have any 30, 60, 90, 120, etc late pays listed...YET....it was listed under Negative accounts.... so..... even though its not showing any late pays on your TU report for the account that reports late elsewhere...it does appear to be a negative account....therefore disputing it whichever route you decide, won't make it appear worse as you said, or further lower your score.
One further question: looking at my Experian report, it describes the status of the Capital One account as "Paid,Closed. $760 written off." I'm unclear on what that means: are they saying I actually owed $760 on the account when it was closed, they wrote off the amount, and that's how it was "paid"? If that's the case, I'm worried about tolling the 7-year period again: the statute of limitations doesn't expire for another 6 months, meaning they could basically take the dispute as a wake-up call to ask me for payment again, and while I think I paid it off in full, I wouldn't bet my life on it. Ugh, this is getting more, not less, complicated the further I go into it. Please help!
The 7 year reporting period goes from the date of first delinquency that ultimately led to the charge-off. What date was this? The SOL is based off the same. Paid/Closed $760 written off, means this account was charged-off. Yes, they are saying that was what was owed on the account, but have since taken it off their books and I think they get some sort of tax credit/write-off (IDK for sure, maybe someone else can give better info on it)
SOL may or may not be the same start date as the DoFD; it depends on THAT STATE'S legislation, and what situations in THAT STATE'S legislation allows for tolling and suspension of the SOL. Specifically in the OP's instance, SOL depending on the state tolled when they went to another country and were unreachable; or if they moved to another state.
How soon are you hoping to buy your home? If more than six months, the safe bet is to leave the debt dormant and wait out the SOL. (Mindcrime is correct in regards to the DOFD above) I don't see the DOFD in your first post - are you sure it's to expire this year?
I've been running down old bank statements to verify that I did, in fact, pay off Capital One when I think I did. I'm sitting tight on that TL at least until I can confirm that it was paid so I don't wake anything up. In the meantime, I got a phone call from AES acknowledging receipt of my letter. I've seen reports online from other people in similar situations who've had AES acknowledge the letter and then tell them, very politely, that they won't (though I'm sure they say "can't") help; I'm crossing my fingers that they'll be more forgiving in my case. Assuming that there's nothing I can do on either of the delinquencies on my reports, any other suggestions? My revolving utilization has never been that high, but every point helps at this stage, so I just paid down to zero a CareCredit account I opened for my brother last year that had $1800 outstanding of a $5k limit, and will try moving my day-to-day spending from my Amex and Visa (which I already pay off twice a month, but typically get to a couple grand, collectively, in between) to my debit card to keep them zeroed out. How many points could I hope to gain from the authorized-user trick if paying down the revolving balances doesn't do it?
Heather L. is a big proponent of the authorized user route. From everything I've seen in the Forum, it's a hit and miss approach to building credit but it has worked in the past. That said, it varies depending on the credit line and the existing balance of the card. Ideally, you want to be added to a credit account that's in pristine shape; high limit, low (or no) balance and a cardholder attached to the card that you can trust with your (credit) life. If the card you decide to piggyback on has a low limit and is used sparingly, you won't see much of an improvement to your score. But if it's an active card with a high limit, you'll see a definite boost - hard to say exactly how much, but around 10 points sounds right over the course of a few months. Can anyone speak to a real case study in which they became an authorized user and saw a significant improvement in score?
I'll report back on the AU route sometime in the next four to six weeks Jason. I was recently added as one to my fiancée's CC. Long history, decent CL, zero balance. It may boost me more than others though as it will then be my longest tradeline reporting. Cj, considering your scores (they're high/good), it doesn't look like those C1 delinquencies are hurting you much. Time is a factor, and you're at the 6 year mark at this point (7 is the magic number) and the older the delinquency, the less impact on your credit score it has. I'm not saying that getting them removed wouldn't help, it will, but a new(er) delinquency removed will drive a score up more.
Yeah, everyone I talk to insists that the old delinquencies aren't hurting me that much, but there are no other negative items on my credit file, so there are no newer delinquencies to be removed. Not sure what else there is to do, hence my question as to how much of an effect I might hope for from the authorized-user trick.
Well, it's been about three weeks since I got a call from AES acknowledging receipt of my letter and saying they'd get back to me, and I haven't heard anything else. I'm guessing that one's a no-go. If I've already sent a letter to the CEO, is it worth sending a letter to anyone else, or is that it? Separately, I tracked down my old checking statements and confirmed that I did pay off my Capital One bill way back in May 2007. So, to repeat the question, is it worth trying a Not Mine letter, or are there any ill effects I could stir up? In other words, what's the worst that could happen?
Is planetfeedback still a resource like it was a decade or so ago? Back then writing public letters to businesses helped you to get noticed and greatly improved the chance of getting something done (no guarantees though). I have not used it in a very long time and don't know if the pull it once had is still there. It is possible that they are 'doing something' and just won't inform you in writing. Worst that can happen -- you're in the same position you're in now, or in other words, nothing. You've already paid off the charge-off. There's nothing more for them to try to extract from you. The account should read as Paid/Closed account with a zero balance, and all bureaus should list the same DofLD for the compliance date and that's your starting point for 7 years. You could try a Not Mine dispute with the CRA. I'm not sure I would bother with the OC...they've got their money and have no incentive for helping you and with my experience with C1 they aren't the helpful type -- maybe others have had better luck. But no, there's nothing to worry about as far as restarting the timeframe this account is allowed to report and since you don't owe any money, they're not going to come after you if you wake them up with a Not Mine dispute.
Paid-closed? It currently reads as "paid charge off", with current status "bad debt/collection" on the Equifax report. This is different?
The Paid/Bad Debt/Collection combination means that the account was most likely sold to a JDB. The only caveat with a "NOT MINE" letter is that post-FACTA DFs have been sending letters demanding consumers go through "fraud" investigation processes including police reports any time that someone says "NOT MINE". The validity of making every single "NOT MINE" go through the FACTA "fraud" processes is questionable, because it relies on the incorrect assertion that DFs and CRAs never, even accidentally, update any information in a manner which is in any way, shape, or form inaccurate.
Wait, what? I was under the impression that sending one of these letters was pretty much SOP around here, and that there was little downside, as per mindcrime's post. Am I starting something I don't want to start around here? I'm certainly not prepared to file a (fraudulent) police report and wouldn't feel comfortable if a DF started hounding me for one.
While I understand what jam is saying, in cases where I have disputed as not mine, I wasn't asked to go through a fraud investigation. The idea (and hope) behind the its not mine dispute is, the creditor will simply be lazy and not respond. You're not trying to get the account to report paid/never late are you?
