Unknown Collection Hurting Scores

Anonymous · ‎05-18-2017

Hi everyone. I have in Month 5 of my Credit Rebuild Journey. The baddies on my reports are 2 charges off paid in full. And on equifax there is this one collection called the collection bearue of america. I disputed this collection and without the investigation being complete; this account just showed up on my experian report dropping my score from 696 to 672. Current UTI is 10% with overall available credit of 50K. I have gotten 6 cards in the past three months and my last app was April 20, 2017.

Current FICO scores are TU: 695, EX 672 and EQ: 638. I dont know what else can I do to bring the scores up. I am 99% sure that the collection and I disputed it. Now its showing up on 2 CB;s.

What can I do to recover from this? I have to let my reports thaw; I understand that but what else? to bring it 700 all across CB's?

Please advice

Anonymous · ‎05-18-2017

Probably for Comcast or DISH network or something like that. Call your old OCs for TV channels and see if you owe them for old equipment not returned. Ask them tor recall the collection back and when it falls off your reports, pay the OC.

As for your scores, saying you have a 10% overall utilization isn't helpful because it doesn't tell us what your highest utilization is on any one card.

Get your overall utilization down, pay off ALL credit cards to $0 and only show utilization on one card every month (9% of less on one card). Make sure you're reporting an open installment loan of some kind (mortgage, student loan, personal loan, SSL, etc) -- non-mortgage installment loans should be reporting low balance versus original loan amount.

Anonymous · ‎05-18-2017

If you really believe the collection is an error dispute it on Equifax and wait for the results from both bureaus before deciding what to do next.

As for your other question I'm not sure you can break 700 with those collection still showing up on your CR, despite them being paid they do still factor into your credit score. Do you know when they're due to fall off?

Anonymous · ‎05-18-2017

Okay. The UTI on one card is 84% due to 0% APR. it's a military star card. All others are 0% or 2% being paid in full before statement cut.

As far as the collections it's showing since 2014 I am not show why it just popped up on experian. It's been there on equifax and I disputed it. Waiting to hear back. I got a letter from these people so I'm going to call them and see what they are going to do.

I do have 1 secured loan and 3 student loans with total of 12K currently on active duty deferment.

I want to break 700 across all three by July next year as I am planning on buying a new car.

I'm worried please advise.

Anonymous · ‎05-18-2017

@Anonymous wrote:
Okay. The UTI on one card is 84% due to 0% APR. it's a military star card. All others are 0% or 2% being paid in full before statement cut.

This is hurting your score as it is very close to the "maxed out" category for FICO. As that drops below 30% your score will improve.

As far as the collections it's showing since 2014 I am not show why it just popped up on experian. It's been there on equifax and I disputed it. Waiting to hear back. I got a letter from these people so I'm going to call them and see what they are going to do.

I do have 1 secured loan and 3 student loans with total of 12K currently on active duty deferment.

I want to break 700 across all three by July next year as I am planning on buying a new car.

I'm worried please advise.

cjane1 · ‎05-18-2017

When I did a dispute it took 30 days to get a reply. With the credit cards you should quit applying for awhile, 6 pulls can bring your score down. The one card with the high utilization, as you pay it down your score will go up depending how much you pay.... I used a credit card for an emergency, that caused a 50% utilization and my credit score dropped 25 points.

Anonymous · ‎05-18-2017

@Anonymous wrote:
Okay. The UTI on one card is 84% due to 0% APR. it's a military star card. All others are 0% or 2% being paid in full before statement cut.

As far as the collections it's showing since 2014 I am not show why it just popped up on experian. It's been there on equifax and I disputed it. Waiting to hear back. I got a letter from these people so I'm going to call them and see what they are going to do.

I do have 1 secured loan and 3 student loans with total of 12K currently on active duty deferment.

I want to break 700 across all three by July next year as I am planning on buying a new car.

I'm worried please advise.

There's no guarantee you'll be able to make that timeline but a lot can change over the course of a year. As others have pointed out your goal should be to pay down your balances to below 30%, dispute the collection and if it doesn't get removed try to negotiate a PFD agreement. Make sure to get this in writing.

Focus on cleaning up your reports and your score will improve, whether you'll be to 700 next July is uncertain but I know a few people that have had trouble breaking this barrier due to collections still showing on their CR.

rmduhon · ‎05-18-2017

Pull your actual EQ report from either annualcreditreport.com (if you haven't already done that in the last 12 months) or from EQ itself and see what the DoFD (Date of First Delinquency) is. That'll determine when the account will fall off the reports. It may be old enough to be gone by next year.

Anonymous · ‎05-19-2017

So based on everyone's advise; I called the collection company and talked to them. Apparently the creditor was a water company that provided me drinking water services in el paso from 2.5 years ago. I made the Pay for Deletion deal with them; paid the outstanding 103 dollars and got the deletion letter in hand right now as I type. Now its the waiting game for them to delete it or will have to dispute it again with the letter this time.

With the collection deleted and a fresh denial from Chase for too much available credit and breaking 700 on TU ; I am going to the garden to grow my 6 babies I earned. I wanted to say thank you to everyone for their support and guidance.

Only baddies left are 2 paid charge off's with DOFD of 2015 and several lates from 2009. So while I am gardening I am going to start sending goodwill letters to see if I can get these taken care off and have a squeaky clean file so I can apply for this nominative assignment to the white house and buy a new car.

Wish me luck!

Much love.

rmduhon · ‎05-19-2017

Do NOT dispute it with the letter if the CA doesn't delete. This is counter to the CRA's policy and can cause the CRA's to not delete the account even if the CA requests deletion. Your next stwo would be to file a BBB complaint or a civil suit.