Finance House

Hi all,

I am so frustrated about what is going on with my Equifax credit report. I'm posting here to vent and request any advice if anyone has any. Anyways, I had a student loan through Nelnet/Unipac. It was opened in 1996. I was 90 days late paying it in 1998, but got back on track and was not past due again. In 2000 I paid off the account and closed it. It has been correctly reported on all three credit bureaus except recently I noticed on Equifax it was showing up as closed with a $0 balance, but in the comments field it said "Not more than 90 days past due". On Privacyguard, it was listed as a delinquent account.

I also have two charge accounts with Citicorp. Around this time I received notice from them that they were removing all available credit from my accounts except obviously what I owed. This now shows me as maxed out on both credit accounts. I pulled my fico score report and saw that my previous credit rating of being almost around 700 is now around 625 due to the 90 days past due notation and the Citicorp cards being at their limit. My guess is Citicorp did this because they thought I was currently 90 days delinquent on the student loan account.

I disputed the notation to Equifax and pointed out that the account was closed in 2000 with a $0 balance and was not 90 days past due. I pulled my Equifax report last week and saw that it was still showing up but it did have a notation that an investigation was in progress. So today I checked Privacyguard and saw that the account showed +120 days past due. I was like "What!!!". I pulled my Equifax report again. There is no notation that it is still being investigated, but now it shows as being 90 days past due in February 2004. Account is still showing up with a $0 balance and closed in 2000.

Where are they getting this bizarre information? They investigated and came up with even worse info...what do I do? This is making me crazy.

Nadine

Originally posted by nlangloi
Hi all,

I am so frustrated about what is going on with my Equifax credit report. I'm posting here to vent and request any advice if anyone has any. Anyways, I had a student loan through Nelnet/Unipac. It was opened in 1996. I was 90 days late paying it in 1998, but got back on track and was not past due again. In 2000 I paid off the account and closed it. It has been correctly reported on all three credit bureaus except recently I noticed on Equifax it was showing up as closed with a $0 balance, but in the comments field it said "Not more than 90 days past due". On Privacyguard, it was listed as a delinquent account.

I also have two charge accounts with Citicorp. Around this time I received notice from them that they were removing all available credit from my accounts except obviously what I owed. This now shows me as maxed out on both credit accounts. I pulled my fico score report and saw that my previous credit rating of being almost around 700 is now around 625 due to the 90 days past due notation and the Citicorp cards being at their limit. My guess is Citicorp did this because they thought I was currently 90 days delinquent on the student loan account.

I disputed the notation to Equifax and pointed out that the account was closed in 2000 with a $0 balance and was not 90 days past due. I pulled my Equifax report last week and saw that it was still showing up but it did have a notation that an investigation was in progress. So today I checked Privacyguard and saw that the account showed +120 days past due. I was like "What!!!". I pulled my Equifax report again. There is no notation that it is still being investigated, but now it shows as being 90 days past due in February 2004. Account is still showing up with a $0 balance and closed in 2000.

Where are they getting this bizarre information? They investigated and came up with even worse info...what do I do? This is making me crazy.

Nadine

Hey Nadine,

we've all been there and lost patches of hair over the antics of the CRAs and anyone involved with them. I think I am immune to it by now, but I am sure one big screw up on their end could send me on a rampage :)

I was curious....was the late in 98 the only thing that was on the CR? You can always go back and dispute it as obsolete information especially if you have a paper trail showing all the bs you are going through right now. If you have it, I would call up EQ and talk to a CSR and tell them what happened.

I just did it with TU over a erroneous judgment that they decided should stay. I stayed calm as I was explaining it and the guy was like nope it has to stay. Then my voice changed from friendly, please help me, to youhaveaboutonesecondbeforeIflipout! I was like so what you are telling me is that the other CRAs removed this and that you are not because someone at the CAs said it was a real debt? I need to know the answer to this because I am going to rip someone's head off for reporting incorrect info and I need to make sure I have the right person. He put me on hold and about 10 seconds later, he came back and told me it was removed and that they were sending me a corrected copy of my report.

In your case, I would explain it calmly and then inform them that because they are reporting incorrect info that you have already had one of your accounts lowered which in turn has hurt your score even more. Sometimes a live person (if you get the right one) can be a huge help. If you get some monkey who won't help you, call back and see if you get someone more helpful. Just make sure you take notes and names and dates and times and get them to send stuff in writing to you after you come to an agreement. If this fails, send off a letter to the FTC and BBB. After you sort it out, I would send a goodwill letter to Citi explaining what happened and what you think the reasoning was behind them doing what they did and see what they say, it can't hurt. Good luck to you!

Ice_siren,

Yes, the late payment in 1998 was the only neg item on my credit report. I called Equifax and spoke to a rep - he pulled up my credit report and saw that it was closed with a $0 balance and yet had a current status of being past due. He opened another investigation. I then called Nelnet to find out if the misinformation was coming from their end - it wasn't. They show the late payment correctly in 1998. In the past I've had good experiences with Equifax investigations. However with this, not only could they not have even looked at the account, because if they did, they would have noticed the closed status, but I do not believe they ever even verified with Nelnet. And then they made the entry worse by sticking on the 120 days past due. I'll be glad when this get sorted out.

Thanks for listening and the advice.