I have been battling a collection agency over a bogus paid collection. I mailed in my validation request to the CA over three weeks ago and have not yet received a reply from them (I know they have a month to reply) nor have I gotten the green card back from the post office. My credit expert score has been stuck at 666. Today it rocketed to 667, the first change since I have been monitoring it. The only change I see is that this paid collection is gone from the report. Does this mean that the CA deleted it? Or is it just a quirk in the CE software - gone today, back tomorrow? Will the CA have to send me a reply to my validation or can they just remove the item from my reports? Of interest, when I used the CE simulator last week (I know it is inaccurate), it said I would get a 120 point boost by deleting this paid collection. I would hate to think that it is only worth 1 point. This is the last negative on my report. I have 38 positive tradelines.
That simulator is a joke! Don't expect anything more than 1/10th of what it shows. As for your CE question.... why not use it to pull the Experian report and see if it's listed, don't worry about the "quirk". It will tell you if it's still under investigation deleted, etc. Remember, despite their false advertising, no lendors use CE scores anyway.
The simulator is just that, a simulator. It only uses about 6 variables to let you get a feel of how the score changes. the real fico uses way more than 6 variables to calculate the score. I would take the simulator scores with a grain of salt. Actually I would take the credit expert score with a grain of salt lol.
I may not have been clear in my post. I did not disputte this with Experian. I asked for a validation from the CA. So there is no dispute in progress with Experian to check on. I checked my CE report today and the paid collection is gone. But, I have heard nothing from the CA. Does the CA have to notify me if they decide to delete rather than validate? Is it possible (or likely) that CE screwed up and omitted this on their own, only to show up later? Also, shouldn't this be worth more than one point? Thanks
Just order a paper report directly from Experian. When you get it, call them and ask whether the tradeline is still there or not. Then get a friendly car/house dealership to pull Experian and see if it is on that version or not. Sometimes, CAs and creditors just delete entries without any customer follow-up. That way, they don't compromise thier relationship with the CRAs and they keep the customer happy with a deleted entry.
