I have several chargeoffs on my report that I need to get repaired. One is for a medical bill from 1998 that my insurance company should have paid, but did not. It was only a few hundred dollars. It is being reported as a chargeoff in 2001 by one of the more-notorious collection agencies. How do I get it removed? Next year, it will be over 7 years, and must be removed, but it is showing up as a 2001 debt. Another one is a few (less than 10) dollar chargeoff from a bank that I had a checking account with, but I stopped using it. After they ran up a few months of charges (for nothing), that emptied my account by a little more than I had in it, it is now being reported as a chargeoff! It is a joke, when you think about it, but it is destroying my credit rating.
EASY The first is removed by sending a letter to the CRA demanding they remove this item since the amount due is not your responsibility. Make them investigate the issue and if they do not respond within 30 days, it will be removed. Odds are the hospital will not bother responding. If they do, then follow up by sending the hospital a letter telling them they have 30 days to remove the item from your reports or you will file suit. Odds again are they will do what you want since sending a lawyer to court will cost more than what is owed. The second one is a piece of cake to get removed. First send a letter to the CRA telling them this account was closed, you closed it, (Pick a date after your last transaction on the account) and demand they remove this item. As in the first one above, the odds are, the item will be deleted by the CRA when the Bank fails to respond. IF the CRA does not delete the item because of a response from the Bank, follow with a letter to the Bank demanding they remove the item or you will file suit. In fact, you probably could get the banks cooperation before contacting the CRA. Call the Bank, explain that you closed the account over the phone (Pick a date sometime after your last transaction) and never received any notices from the bank and forgot about the account. ASK them to send a deletion notice to the CRA and a copy of the notice to YOU. I GURANTEE you that both will be removed. Perhaps in as little as 30 days or as long as 60-90 days if you have to get ROUGH!
