Inquiries and closed accounts?

[Anonymous]

Can inquiries and closed accounts be taken off of CR? and will it help your CS if they are taken off?

[daisyduke]

Hello -  

I had five hard inquiries on Experian RECODED to softies b/c yes, they affect your FICO score for the first year. The five were all from the same collection agency. It was clearly abusive and I turned the company in to the BBB....try to ruin me. The Bureaus do not help you get rid of them. YOu are going to have to deal directly with the company....From what I understand, it will be easier to have them recoded to soft than removed completely. who cares on soft.

So for scoring purposes, all inquiries affect your FICO score from the initial date up to 12 month period. After two years inquiries will fall off completely.

Depends on your overall objective. If you are trying to get a house, I bet a dollar to a donut that any LO doesn't care to see them from a collection agency or even trying to secure a bunch of new credit cards.

Since I only had luck with EX (and didn't have any inks on EQ), I can only measure what my plus score was (and that's meaningless score to)...with all the inks and everything the same my Plus Score from Experian was around 670...with all the inquiries off same everything else, it rocketed up to 715... 

[RobertEG]

The FCRA never uses, or recognizes, the terms "hard" or "soft" inquires.  Those are merely coding distintiions when reporting inquiries to a CRA,

The FCRA merely excludes certain types of inquiries to your CR from receiving your full credit report.  Inquires made purely for promotional offers of credit only get your name and address, and are coded as so-called "soft" pulls that have no effect on credit scoring.

If a creditor receives a request initiated by the consumer for the grant of new credit, the extension of addiitional credit, wants your CR to review your current account with them, or is reviewing the account for legitimate collection of debt on the account, they can obtain your full CR.

The FCRA does not mandate coding of these inquireis with the CRAs. Sometimes, a creditor will code a request for a CLI  or review of an account under their collection as a "soft pull," but they are is no statutory regualion of this reporting.  In fact, FCRA 603(m) specificaly states that ordering a credit report for the purpose of collecting on an account does not exclude the request from full access to the CR as being a transaction that was not initiated by the consumer.

[Anonymous]

It's probably not accurate to term hard or soft inquiries as full or not full access to your credit report.  Promotional (PRM) inquiries are given limited information on the individual, but softs not only consist of PRM, but also account reviews (AR) and one or two others.   

Back when the FCRA was enacted there was little issue with hard vs. soft inquiries and their effect on your credit score.  However, the FTC's Financial Practices Division has taken note of the issue and is recommending it be addressed.  meanwhile, according the the FTC FPD, there is legislative intent to preclude certain creditors / collection agents permissible purpose -- at least for a hard pull.

AmEx is notorious for performing ARs until the end of time on closed accounts in which AmEx has taken a loss.  Sometimes, however, there have been slips and the inquiries have appeared as hard inquiries.  If the debt is past the maximum reporting period, the FTC FPD has indicated that there is legislative intent that indicates that creditor has no permissible purpose -- at least for a hard pull. 

If you believe that the creditor had no permissible purpose for accessing your credit report, you can dispute the inquiry with the CRA.  I have seen where the CRAs will remove these inquiries, but there is a good chance you'll end up with a 90-day fraud alert on your credit report.