What To Do About Closed Accounts On Credit Report

Follow Up After The Investigation

Heres what to expect when the investigation is complete:

• The results of the investigation, in writing, from the credit reporting bureau.
• A free copy of your credit report, if the report has changed.

What about parties who have seen your incorrect information? You can ask the credit bureaus to notify them of the corrections, the FTC says. This includes:

• Notifying anyone who received your report in the past six months.
• Sending a corrected copy of your report to anyone who received it in the past two years.

But what if the investigation doesnt resolve your dispute? If the furnisher continues to report the error, you can ask the credit bureaus to include a statement in your credit file that describes your side of the dispute and it will be included in future credit reports. For a fee, you can usually ask the credit bureau to send a copy of the statement to anyone who has recently received a copy of your report.

Also, if you believe you were treated unfairly or a valid error remains on your credit report, you can file a complaint with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. The CFPB is required to forward the complaint to the company with which you have an issue. The CFPB usually will provide you with a response within 15 days.

How long can it take for an error to be corrected on your credit report after the dispute is resolved? Credit bureaus have five business days after finishing their investigation to notify you of the results.

How Long Does Information Stay On My Equifax Credit Report

Reading time: 3 minutes

Highlights:

• Most negative information generally stays on credit reports for 7 years
• Bankruptcy stays on your Equifax credit report for 7 to 10 years, depending on the bankruptcy type
• Closed accounts paid as agreed stay on your Equifax credit report for up to 10 years

When it comes to credit reports, one of the most frequently asked questions is: How long does information stay on my Equifax ? The answer is that it depends on the type of information and whether its considered positive or negative.;

Generally speaking, negative information such as late or missed payments, accounts that have been sent to collection agencies, accounts not being paid as agreed, or bankruptcies stays on credit reports for approximately seven years. Here is a breakdown of some the different types of negative information and how long you can expect the information to be on your Equifax credit report:

Here are some examples of “positive” information and how long it stays on your Equifax credit report :

• Active accounts paid as agreed. Active credit accounts that are paid as agreed remain on your Equifax credit report as long as the account is open and the lender is reporting it. ;
• Closed accounts paid as agreed. If the last status of the account is reported by the lender as paid as agreed, the account can stay on your Equifax credit report for up to 10 years from the date it was reported by the lender to Equifax.

How Long Does Information Stay On Your Reports

The FCRA limits how long a credit reporting agency can report negative items in your credit report. Items that aren’t negative but are neutral or positive can be reported indefinitely. Review the rules below and then check your credit report for negative items that are too old to be reported.

No Negative Credit Reporting If You Make an Agreement Due to Coronavirus

Under the federal Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act, if you make an agreement with a creditor to defer one or more payments, make a partial payment, forbear any delinquent amounts, modify a loan or contract, or get any other assistance or relief because COVID-19 affected you, the creditor must report the account as current to the credit reporting agencies if you weren’t already delinquent.

Also Check: What Company Is Syncb Ppc

When To Negotiate With A Creditor

This likely won’t work if the charged-off account belongs to you and all the information being reported about it is accurate. In that scenario, you could try negotiating with the creditor or debt collector to update or remove the charge-off account from your credit file. This is called “pay for delete,” and essentially you’re asking for the account to be removed from your credit reports in exchange for a fee.;

Pay for delete arrangements are legal under the Fair Credit Reporting Act, but there are a few things to know. First, creditors aren’t obligated to honor your request and remove charge-offs from your credit. So while you can ask for a pay-for-delete, there’s no guarantee that a creditor or debt collector will agree to it.

Second, if they do agree, you’ll likely need to pay the account in full. However, if an account has been delinquent for some time, the creditor may be willing to accept a settlement in which you pay less than the full amount. Either way, you’ll almost certainly have to pay something toward the debt.;

How We Make Money

You have money questions. Bankrate has answers. Our experts have been helping you master your money for over four decades. We continually strive to provide consumers with the expert advice and tools needed to succeed throughout lifes financial journey.

Bankrate follows a strict editorial policy, so you can trust that our content is honest and accurate. Our award-winning editors and reporters create honest and accurate content to help you make the right financial decisions. The content created by our editorial staff is objective, factual, and not influenced by our advertisers.

Were transparent about how we are able to bring quality content, competitive rates, and useful tools to you by explaining how we make money.

Bankrate.com is an independent, advertising-supported publisher and comparison service. We are compensated in exchange for placement of sponsored products and, services, or by you clicking on certain links posted on our site. Therefore, this compensation may impact how, where and in what order products appear within listing categories. Other factors, such as our own proprietary website rules and whether a product is offered in your area or at your self-selected credit score range can also impact how and where products appear on this site. While we strive to provide a wide range offers, Bankrate does not include information about every financial or credit product or service.

Don’t Miss: How To Report To A Credit Bureau Landlord

How Long Will A Paid

It can take one or two billing cycles for a loan or credit card to appear as closed or paid off. Thats because lenders typically report monthly. Once it has been reported, it can be reflected in your credit score.

You can check your free credit report on NerdWallet;to see when an account is reported as being closed.

About the authors:Bev O’Shea writes about credit for NerdWallet. Her work has appeared in the New York Times, Washington Post, MarketWatch and elsewhere.Read more

Lindsay Konsko is a former staff writer covering credit cards and consumer credit for NerdWallet.Read more

Identify Any Credit Report Errors

Review your credit reports periodically for inaccurate or incomplete information. You can get one free credit report from each of the three major credit bureaus Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion once a year at annualcreditreport.com. You can also subscribe, usually at a cost, to a credit monitoring service and review your report monthly.

Some common credit report errors you might spot include:

• Identity mistakes such as an incorrect name, phone number or address.
• A so-called mixed file that contains account information belonging to another consumer. This may occur when you and another consumer have the same or similar names.
• An account incorrectly attributed to you due to identity theft.
• A closed account thats still being reported as open.
• An incorrect reporting of you as an account owner, when you are just an authorized user on an account.
• A remedied delinquency such as a collections account that you paid off yet still shows as unpaid.
• An account thats incorrectly labelled as late or delinquent, which could include outdated information such as a late payment thats over 7 years old or an incorrect date regarding your last payment.
• The same debt listed more than once.
• An account listed more than once with different creditors.
• Incorrect account balances.
• Inaccurate credit limits.

Also Check: What Credit Score Does Carmax Use

How To Remove A Charge

Removing charge-offs or other negative information from your credit reports can be tricky. Technically, negative credit information that’s accurate can legally remain on your credit reports for seven years, and some types of negative information can stay even longer.

That being said, there are some remedies for dealing with charge-offs. The first is disputing a charged-off account if you believe it’s being reported in error. Federal law allows you to initiate a dispute with the that’s reporting information you believe to be inaccurate. The credit bureau then has to investigate your claim and if there is an error, correct it or remove it.

Ashley Davison Of Credit Saint Responds

Hi, Hershel, and thanks for your question.

Youre right that your score should recover in a few months. As long as youre not planning on applying for any new loans or credit cards during that time, it would not be too much of a problem. However, its always a good idea to make sure the information in your is as accurate as possible.

Read Also: How Long Does A Repossession Stay On Your Credit Report

Why Do I Have A Credit Report

Businesses want to know about you before they lend you money. Would you want to lend money to someone who pays bills on time? Or to someone who always pays late?

Businesses look at your credit report to learn about you. They decide if they want to lend you money, or give you a credit card. Sometimes, employers look at your credit report when you apply for a job. Cell phone companies and insurance companies look at your credit report, too.

It’s Possible To Negotiate A Pay

• When Removing Isn’t Possible

Your is important for buying a home, getting a car loan in your name, or just opening a credit card account. A significant part of your score is based on how you manage payments for loans, credit cards, and other types of credit. Having an account fall delinquent can lead to a charge-off, which can cost you major credit score points.

Negative information, including charge-offs, can remain on your credit history for up to seven years. But it may be possible to remove a charge-off from your credit sooner than that so you can begin rebuilding your credit score.;

Recommended Reading: Paypal Credit Soft Pull

Get A Free Copy Of Your Credit Report

The Fair Credit Reporting Act promotes the accuracy and privacy of information in the files of the nations credit reporting companies. Monitoring your credit report is a necessary practice to keep in check any negative information. Consumers should obtain their free credit report and review it at least once a year to catch any irregularities on time and keep track of disputed items.

Consumers are entitled by law to a free annual credit report from each of the three main reporting bureaus: Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion, and you can access all three of them through one single website:

AnnualCreditReport.com is the only authorized website through which you can gain free access to your credit report from the three major bureaus. Be wary of other sites that promise the same, as they may have hidden fees, try to sell something, or collect personal information.

Equifax made headlines in 2017 due to a massive data breach, but it remains one of the top 3 services to get your credit report. The company provides a few different service levels if you want to monitor your credit score monthly . Monitoring packages start at $14.95 per month, and the $19.95 per month options include, ironically, a host of identity-theft protection options.

What Can Do To Repair Your Credit History While You Wait

The golden rule to a good credit score is to make sure all your credit accounts are paid on time and any past due accounts have been brought up-to-date. Try to reduce your credit balance where possible and keep the balances on revolving accounts low.

Avoid applying for credit if you think there is any chance you may be declined, by checking your credit score and running pre-approved applications you can get a good idea if it will be successful and this reduces the number of checks on your file. Fewer checks mean an improved score.

If any negative information has been put on your file by mistake you can contact the credit agency and ask them to remove it, this is called a notice of correction. When they receive your query they will contact the company who provided the data you are querying and let you know the outcome within 28 days. The credit agency is not legally allowed to change the information on your credit report without permission from the company who originally provided it to them.

Having a low credit score doesnt mean you cant get credit. There are some lenders that specialise in approving loans for borrowers with poor credit. However, those loans typically come with higher interest rates and less favourable terms.

Read Also: Is 779 A Good Credit Score

The Credit Dispute Process

If the account is, in fact, closed then it should show up as being closed on her credit reports.

And, because it hasnt already been updated to show as being closed shes going to have to go through the credit report dispute process to have it updated across all of the credit reporting agencies.

If the credit card issuer still had a record of the account readily available in their systems she would NOT have to go to all three of credit bureaus directly because she can file her dispute directly with her credit card issuer, which then has to correct ALL of the credit reports.

However, it appears that the issuer has no record of the account any longer. This means shell have to go to each of the credit bureaus and file disputes directly with them. So how does our Minter remove the closed account on her credit report? There are actually a few ways she can go about this: online, by phone, or by mail.;

What Is A Closed Account On A Credit Report

A closed account on your is simply any credit tradeline that has been closed, whether it was terminated by the customer or the creditor.;

There are several different reasons why an account may be closed.

If you dont use your account for several months, it could get shut down for inactivity. Photo by Hloom on Flickr.

If you dont use a credit card for several months, for example, you could get your credit card closed for inactivity. In this case, your credit report might say account closed by credit grantor for that account since the lender was the party who terminated the account.

Other reasons a credit card may be closed by the creditor include:

• The credit card issuer is no longer offering that type of credit card or is replacing it with a different card
• The credit card issuer determined that there was fraudulent activity on the account
• The card was stolen or lost

Consumers may also want to close their own credit accounts from time to time, in which case the account might be notated as account closed by consumer. As an example, if one of your credit cards increases its annual fee or if you no longer feel that the fee is worth it, you might decide to close that account.

Don’t Miss: How Accurate Is Creditwise Credit Score

If A Credit Card Is Closed Can It Be Reopened

In some cases, consumers may be able to reopen closed credit cards.

If your account was closed due to fraud or delinquency, banks typically do not allow these accounts to be reopened.

If it was closed voluntarily on your part or closed due to inactivity, however, you might have a chance to reopen the account if you dont wait too long.;

Only some banks will allow this, and those that do have varying time limits as to when you can reopen an account, so check with your credit card issuer.

If youre within the time window and your account is eligible to reopen, heres how to reopen a closed credit card account:

• Be ready to provide your personal information and answer security questions.
• Explain why you closed the account and why you are requesting to reopen it.

Some issuers may require a hard inquiry before they can approve your request, which could cause a small, temporary drop in your credit score.

If your bank doesnt allow you to reopen the card, the next best solution might be to re-apply for the same card or apply for a new credit card altogether.

What To Look For On Your Credit Report

Lenders use codes to send information to the credit bureaus about how and when you make payments.

These codes have two parts:

• a letter shows the type of credit you’re using
• a number shows when you make payments

You may see different codes on your credit report depending on how you make your payments for each account.

Read Also: Does Klarna Improve Credit Score