Another Child Support Issue

Anonymous · ‎01-07-2011

I have been paying my child support and arrearage after finding steady employment now for over 2 yrs. In that time, I have worked extremely hard to knock the arrearage out ($15,000 in 2008 to $3,000 at the beginning of 2010). I have been constantly fighting with the child support services in my state to correctly report the amount that I owe on my credit report. I currently have disputes being investigated w/ all three credit agencies. The dilema I'm having is due to the negative information on my credit reports, my credit scores are in the low to high 600's. However, when I apply for a loan to buy a car, everyone is telling me that my FICO score is 0. I don't understand this at all. In the meantime, I have applied for a secured credit card, attempting to find the culprit of the deceptive information from the child support agency (as of this afternoon, the county circuit clerks office has on record that I'm $8400 in arrears while my credit reports all state $7100), and will pay off a couple of medical bills that I was disputing w/ my insurance company.

Can someone please explain why my credit reports have my scores as 600+ while lenders are reporting a 0?

Anonymous · ‎01-07-2011

@Anonymous wrote:
I have been paying my child support and arrearage after finding steady employment now for over 2 yrs. In that time, I have worked extremely hard to knock the arrearage out ($15,000 in 2008 to $3,000 at the beginning of 2010). I have been constantly fighting with the child support services in my state to correctly report the amount that I owe on my credit report. I currently have disputes being investigated w/ all three credit agencies. The dilema I'm having is due to the negative information on my credit reports, my credit scores are in the low to high 600's. However, when I apply for a loan to buy a car, everyone is telling me that my FICO score is 0. I don't understand this at all. In the meantime, I have applied for a secured credit card, attempting to find the culprit of the deceptive information from the child support agency (as of this afternoon, the county circuit clerks office has on record that I'm $8400 in arrears while my credit reports all state $7100), and will pay off a couple of medical bills that I was disputing w/ my insurance company.

Can someone please explain why my credit reports have my scores as 600+ while lenders are reporting a 0?

Unfortunately, child support agencies are notoriously slow in updating information. Some, if not much, of the problem stems from the various layers involved in the process. Once you pay, the local Child Support Collections Unit will notify the local Child Support Enforcement Unit who, in turn needs to inform CSEU on the state level and then, if there are no other layers to navigate, will inform the credit bureau reporting side what to report to the credit bureaus.

Hopefully someone will come along here and shed some light on your credit score question as I am not sure about that one.

Anonymous · ‎01-07-2011

Hi ChildsupportReform,

Welcome!

IMO, your disputes through the CRA are a good move. Also, be willing to send them paperwork to confirm your numbers if the disputes come back verified.

Now, your scores. First off - where are you pulling your scores from? That would be helpful to know.

It appears that you're pulling your credit reports. If you also pull a FICO score from this site (google "myfico discount codes" first) and bring it in with you when apping for a car, perhaps they can explain to you what they're looking at as far as credit scores are concerned.

Anonymous · ‎01-07-2011

Thank you, but what concerns me is that on my credit report Child Support is reporting a past due balance of $7,196 with a balance of $1,098. However, my trip down to the county circuit clerk's office this afternoon reports just the opposite; they have me owing a balance of $7,196, which is totally wrong! On top of disputing my credit reports, I have also contacted my governor's office about this as well. I think I'll stop by my local state representative's office on Monday before work. The only time that I was successful in getting child support to listen to me was when I had my lawyer step in. They still found a way to put the burden back on me, and now my lawyer is tired of dealing with me and them.

Anonymous · ‎01-07-2011

Thank you beamMeup!

I think that I'm going to beat child support to the punch and send them some supporting documents for my dispute. I need this thing resolved quickly! I have some training to attend next month and it would be best for me to drive there. As far as my scores, I've pulled them from just about everywhere! This site, freecreditreport, as well as all three agencies! I've been in so much disbelief that I had to see what information was out there about me. It was like being in an episode of the Twilight Zone!

Anonymous · ‎01-08-2011

@Anonymous wrote:
I have been paying my child support and arrearage after finding steady employment now for over 2 yrs. In that time, I have worked extremely hard to knock the arrearage out ($15,000 in 2008 to $3,000 at the beginning of 2010). I have been constantly fighting with the child support services in my state to correctly report the amount that I owe on my credit report. I currently have disputes being investigated w/ all three credit agencies. The dilema I'm having is due to the negative information on my credit reports, my credit scores are in the low to high 600's. However, when I apply for a loan to buy a car, everyone is telling me that my FICO score is 0. I don't understand this at all. In the meantime, I have applied for a secured credit card, attempting to find the culprit of the deceptive information from the child support agency (as of this afternoon, the county circuit clerks office has on record that I'm $8400 in arrears while my credit reports all state $7100), and will pay off a couple of medical bills that I was disputing w/ my insurance company.

Can someone please explain why my credit reports have my scores as 600+ while lenders are reporting a 0?

Are all of the tradelines on your credit report in dispute, by chance? Do you have open, active tradelines when you pull your credit reports? Can you copy & paste your tradelines here (minus account numbers, and other personally identifying information)? It'd help to know what, exactly, is on your credit report, and how (exactly) it's being reported.

There's no such thing as a zero FICO score. Lack of recent credit history can result in the inability of FICO to generate a credit score for you, however.

Anonymous · ‎01-08-2011

@Anonymous wrote:

Thank you, but what concerns me is that on my credit report Child Support is reporting a past due balance of $7,196 with a balance of $1,098. However, my trip down to the county circuit clerk's office this afternoon reports just the opposite; they have me owing a balance of $7,196, which is totally wrong! On top of disputing my credit reports, I have also contacted my governor's office about this as well. I think I'll stop by my local state representative's office on Monday before work. The only time that I was successful in getting child support to listen to me was when I had my lawyer step in. They still found a way to put the burden back on me, and now my lawyer is tired of dealing with me and them.

Just to be clear, have you been paying your arears back, in addition to keeping up your current payments in full?

Anonymous · ‎01-08-2011

@Anonymous wrote:
@Anonymous wrote:

Thank you, but what concerns me is that on my credit report Child Support is reporting a past due balance of $7,196 with a balance of $1,098. However, my trip down to the county circuit clerk's office this afternoon reports just the opposite; they have me owing a balance of $7,196, which is totally wrong! On top of disputing my credit reports, I have also contacted my governor's office about this as well. I think I'll stop by my local state representative's office on Monday before work. The only time that I was successful in getting child support to listen to me was when I had my lawyer step in. They still found a way to put the burden back on me, and now my lawyer is tired of dealing with me and them.
Just to be clear, have you been paying your arears back, in addition to keeping up your current payments in full?

That could also be a reason.

Best to have his local CSEU perform an account audit and give him an up-to-date accounting. If that doesn't discover the error, than it's probably the lag time between the various departments updating their records. This often happens.

Anonymous · ‎01-08-2011

Not everything is in dispute. The child support and two collections that I have no idea where they came from. One collection is a medical bill for $54, which I'll pay if they can prove to me where it came from, because I have no idea where it generated from (some emergency bill & I haven't used emergency services). The other is a cell phone bill, which might be some mistaken identity stuff. I've been trying for months to get Sprint to stop sending me correspondence regarding someone's account who has the same name as me, but lives in another state.

Anonymous · ‎01-08-2011

Of course, yes. It's part of the same court order. There's a huge mistake being made somewhere, and it's killing me to get down to where the problem is, because as you all know child support is NEVER wrong. I was getting updates from them when I paid my arreage down like clockwork; 12,000, 8,000, and finally 3,000. After that, all the problems began to happen and the snowball (dungball really) is getting bigger and bigger.