Pay for Deletion - Needs Signature?

[HappySarah]

Hi,

A collection agency account appeared in my credit report, and after reading a lot in your helpful forum, I called the agency and asked for a Pay for Deletion. Suprisingly, they agreed to do it pretty easy, and even agreed to fax me a written agreement to remove all data from my report. That was last night and because I didn't have a fax machone in my house, I asked them to wait till the next morning. When I called this morning they were still willing to do it, EXCEPT that when I asked them if the agreement letter is SIGNED by an Authorized Person, they said that they usually don't sign those PFD letters and it's a standard practice! I told them that I will only pay if it's signed, because otherwise it's not a legal document. They tried to tell me that if it has the company's letterhead, then that should be enough.

I have no knowledge of the law, and I honestly don't know if they're lying or not. I read stories about people who got PFD in writing and still had to fight the CA for breaching the agreement and not deleting the account. I just want to cover all my options.

Thoughts?

Thank you.

Sarah

[RobertEG]

It would seal the fact of written contract if signed agreement were received, so yes, it is desirable.

But to require it as an absolute condition is not something I would advocate.

They have legitimate basis for not wanting to put an official stamp on their agreement.  Deltion based on payment of a debt is contrary to their reporting agreement with the CRAs, who have a polcy against such deletions.  They most likely dont want formal documents floating about.

You have an oral contract.  Not as easy to prove in court, but nonethless actionable should they not comply, and not something they are likely to go to court over once they have the $$.

Having made the request and been declined, personally I would rely on their word and the fact that it is an oral contract for which they have little to gain in breaching.

They get the $$, and no business gain from not deleting.

[HappySarah]

Thank you for your insight. I talked to them and they nicely stated that signing the written agreement is something they don't do. They assured me that they have done PFD before and that they will report to the CRA for deletion immediately. I decided to take a loop of faith and take their word for it. They faxed me a written agreement. It was an Account Reconcillation Form, and in the Note section they added "At your request, we agree to request the above mentioned account be deleted from credit reporting with a one time payment for the balance in full". He told me I should expect it to be removed from my report by mid Novermber (so in 2 weeks).

I will update you guys when it's removed

[NibblesTreats]

Happy Sarah,

Good for you!  I have yet to have any luck with a PFD myself - although I haven't even received a response so I could be wrong, but that's great that they are being nice to deal with and even saying yes.  Please let us know how it all works out for you!

[ac921ol]

fingers crossed, goodluck.

[HappySarah]

So just an update on this. Two weeks after my payment in full, the collection record was deleted from my Experian report and my score got back to the 700s. I was very happy, and didn't think about checking the other reporting CRA since I would have had to pay to see it.

For some reason, I decided to pay the $24 today and see my 3 scores, and I was shocked to see that the collection record was never deleted from Equifax

I will call the Collection Company today again, and try to get this fixed! I hope the same guy still works there because he was really nice. I will ask for him by name.

Wish me luck!

[Whitneyy]

Hey Sarah!

What ever ended up happening with your story? I'm interested to know as I will be sending off GW letters to some collections I paid in full.

[guiness56]

You also need to remember that one CRA can be faster than the others.  It is a manual deletion and can take up to 90 days.

[HappySarah]

So here is what happened. I called the Collection Agency, and asked for the guy that handled my inquiry by name, and they let me talk to him which was really great!! He told me that he sent a request for deletion of the collection account to all the credit reporting agencies, and that if it hasn’t been deleted from Equifax then I should talk to them and dispute it. I went to Equifax website and filed an online dispute. A day later, they sent me a follow-up email asking me to fax, email, or mail a copy of (social security card, driving license, and a utility bill). I didn’t feel comfortable doing this, and I also got too busy to call them and figure it out, so I kinda just ignored it for a couple of weeks. After 3 weeks of filing the dispute, they sent me an email with the dispute result! Here is the wording I got.

The Results Of Our Reinvestigation

Collection Agency Information

 (This section includes accounts that have been placed for collection with a collection agency.)

>>> We have researched the collection account. Account # - xxxxxxxx The results are:

This item has been deleted from the credit file. If you have additional questions about this item please contact:

State Collection Service,, 2509 S Stoughton Rd, Madison WI 53716-3314

I looked at my Equifax credit report, and the only thing that has changed is making the account closed instead of open  This won’t help me at all! I need the entire collection account to be deleted, like Experian did! I will call Equifax and figure this out! I hope I will be able to fix it!

[-NewGuy-]

As stressful as all of these seems right now, you are going to be fine. You have a letter from the company (albeit not signed, but on company letterhead), saying it should be deleted. Furthermore, you have Equifax saying they will delete. CRAs know how to word things, so if they meant they were going to change to closed they wouldn't have said "delete from file". Just follow up, and I'm sure they'll correct their mistake. Good luck!