trying this again...my computer sucks. I acutally have a creditor who is willing to change late payments to 'never late' (I sent a goodwill letter) but she is concerned with the legalities. she doesnt think its legal to call a CRA and request that late payments be changed. she was concerned about accuracy. I couldnt really argue that with her. she sent me a letter saying she would just delete the entire tradeline, thinking that would help me. NOOOOOOOO! these are 2 great TLs, each with one late payment, both at least 5 years old, and both were loans for several thousand dollars. they are both paid and closed. She wants me to fax to her exactly what i want from them, so she can show it to someone there who knows more about this. she admitted she didnt know much about credit reporting, and she just started her job last week. (she actually said "i dont really think changing these late payments will help your scores at all.") What is a good way to go about getting these TLs changed when i have someone willing to help me? here's what i have so far for the fax i'm sending: --------------------- Thank you for taking the time to address my concerns about my credit scores. Please understand that I do not wish for accounts XXXX or XXXX to be deleted, rather I would like them updated to show "never late". I will be disputing these late payments very soon with the Credit Bureaus as â??never lateâ?. If the late payments are verified by [creditor company name], they will continue to hurt my credit profile. If the late payments are simply not verified when the Credit Reporting Agencies (Experian, Equifax, Trans Union) contact you, the trade lines will most likely be updated to reflect â??paid, never lateâ?. Alternatively, a simple (hand-signed) letter from your office to me stating the the late notations were reported to the bureaus in error would also be effective. I could then forward a copy of such a letter to to bureaus along with my disputes and achieve a positive end result. Again, I sincerely appreciate your help. ------------------------- are my suggestions legal, and will they work? thanks.
I don't want to dish out advice that someone might not agree with....but I really think if this chick has "someone" look at it, they're gonna say no. It's a good plan to dispute the lates with the CRA, and even better to try with the OC, but I just have a feeling due to 'legalities' I'm sure they'll come up with that they won't go for it. (the OC) I'd dispute with the CRA's first and see if they verify. Hopefully someone on this board like Butch will see this and offer their thoughts regarding your letter.
I acutally have a creditor who is willing to change late payments to 'never late' (I sent a goodwill letter) but she is concerned with the legalities. she doesnt think its legal to call a CRA and request that late payments be changed. she was concerned about accuracy. The 'legalities' I spoke of are those that she mentioned in this paragraph.
Re: Re: getting rid of lates legally II True, but doesn't the law say that what is reported must be accurate?
Re: Re: getting rid of lates legally II but what they DO report must be accurate, right? and i DO want these to be reported. We arent talking about having something deleted, we're talking about having it changed. basically i'm asking them to report something inaccurately. so I totally understand where they're coming from if they tell me 'no'. however, i know these goodwill approaches have worked, and i wonder...what did the creditors do in those cases? Not verify? Lie and claim there was an error in reporting? *sigh* I want CRAs to report accurately, until it comes to this, lol. but i think its absolutely ABSURD that an 11,000 loan, paid PERFECTLY, except for one lousy payment, over a 5 year period, is considered a NEGATIVE on my credit reports!!! 59 perfect payments out of 60 sounds pretty damn positive to me. what a sham.
Re: Re: getting rid of lates legally II I just read your post and I posted something very similar..(sorry board). I just got back two of my goodwill letters and they stated the same thing. Im going to watch this thread closely and see if anyone can come up with any ideas...i know this has worked in the past for others...??
Re: Re: Re: getting rid of lates legally II Yes, but there is no law saying they have to report negative information. """"""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""
Re: Re: getting rid of lates legally II The problem with disputing lates with a CRA is sometimes the CRA just deletes the WHOLE account if the creditor doesn't verify, especially on a closed account. I don't know too much about the "legalities" of a creditor doing a goodwill adjustment. It might be against the terms of their contracts with the CRA, to delete lates when you were late. I don't think it is any of the cra's BUSINESS if a creditor is willing to do a goodwill adjustment. But they might make it their business with their **crafty** contracts with creditors. Also, I don't see how a cra would know a creditor did a "goodwill" adjustment??
Re: Re: Re: getting rid of lates legally II WHO IN THEIR RIGHT MIND WOULD TRY TO PROSECUTE IT??? CAPITAL ONE doesn't have to have "CREDIT LIMIT" so why can't a trade line be changed a little???
Re: Re: Re: getting rid of lates legally II If you dispute these TLs as never late you run a very high risk of them being deleted entirely. If not the OC then CRA may very well do so. Also realize it is entirely within their rights to do so. If it were me I would leave these two alone and move on to removing other negitives or adding positive TLs. In any event good luck in achieving your goals.
Re: Re: getting rid of lates legally II On the upside, if the account does get deleted with a dispute, you can likely get the creditor to agree to RE-report the account. Happened to me once, I acidentally disputed NEVER LATE on an account that was already reporting NEVER LATE. I called the CRA and said it was an accident and asked for them to disregard the dispute. I even next day air mailed them a letter explaining I hit the wrong key on the online dispute and to take back the dispute. Well, of course at the end of 30 days, the whole account with the perfect history was DELETED. I called the CRA and they refused to reinstate the account. But the creditor agreed to re-report the account. Can you guess which CRA it was?
Re: Re: getting rid of lates legally II i'd bet it was equifax. they've been the hardest headed jerks to me thus far.
How long ago was the late payment? If more than 2 years, probably not hitting your score too much anyway...
crowmom, let me try to explain it ... [color=0066FF]FCRA § 616. Civil liability for willful noncompliance (a) In general. Any person who willfully fails to comply with any requirement imposed under this title with respect to any consumer is liable to that consumer ... [/color] [color=0066FF]FCRA § 617. Civil liability for negligent noncompliance (a) In general. Any person who is negligent in failing to comply with any requirement imposed under this title with respect to any consumer is liable to that consumer ...[/color] So, you are the only one, who can take legal action against them. [color=0066FF]FCRA § 616. Civil liability for willful noncompliance (a) ... in an amount equal to the sum of (1)(A) any actual damages sustained by the consumer as a result of the failure or damages of not less than $100 and not more than $1,000; [/color] [color=0066FF]FCRA § 617. Civil liability for negligent noncompliance (a) ... in an amount equal to the sum of (1) any actual damages sustained by the consumer as a result of the failure; [/color] So, you are the only one, who can take legal action against them, but in order to do so, you must prove actual damages. Having an account reported as "never late" will never bring any damages ...
