Advice on how to remove late payments reported to the bureaus on my student loan

[Anonymous]

I have read many articles on what strategies have been used to remove late payments on student loans to the US Dept of Education from my credit report (such as writing Goodwill Letters), but my situation seems to me more unique and I'm not sure how to approach them.

I am extremely fortunate to have parents who have taken it upon themselves to pay for my education and make the payments on my student loans. The loans are set up in my name and I wasn't involved really at all when these were being set up. I'm not 100% informed on how these loans work or what the actual situation was, but it looks like the first 4 payments on the loan after I graduated were made.

After that there were 9 payments that were missed (I haven't really been told the exact reason why, my parents might've just forgotten), the loan went into default, and it was reported to the credit bureaus which is negatively affecting my credit score. 

I believe my parents opted for the loan rehabilitation program which removed the default from my credit, but I still have those 9 late payments on my report. Also, it looks like my loan was transferred from the US Dept of Education to Nelnet. There haven't been any late payments reported since.

I wouldn't know how to approach the US Department of Education with a goodwill letter, because this genuinely was at no fault of mine but I'm the one being effected by it. Don't get me wrong I'm not at all upset with my parents over this - they are the ones still paying off the loan and I don't want to come off as ungrateful, but when my credit gets pulled and the report shows "poor on time payments" (specifically 9) it really hinders my qualifications for applications for renting apartments, getting a car loan, getting credit cards, etc. 

I haven't been applying for all of those things because I've been trying to be patient and let my credit score repair itself through time and responsible financial management, but I want to know if anyone knows of an approach I could take to speed up my credit recovery from this or better yet - get it removed from my report. Or what approach I should take if I were to send a goodwill letter.

I would appreciate any suggestions, thanks!

[Anonymous]

How long ago did you complete the loan rehab?  People seem to have varying degrees of luck with having student loan lates removed, I however was one of the lucky ones and also had my loans through the Department of Education.  After I completed the rehab process, I disputed all of the loans with the CRAs with the following comment:

I completed the Student Loan Rehabilitation Program on _________.  According to the Dept of Education once the rehab is complete all negative /default and late marks are to be removed from my file.

This may or may not work for you, but all of my previous tradelines on TU and EX were deleted.  EQ just deleted the payment history.  It also took two rounds of disputes with them.  My credit reports still aren't pretty, but they are definitely improved with those lates removed!

[gdale6]

Hi there OP,

Welcome to the board. I want to let you know that I removed your cross post on this in our RYC forum as our TOS doesnt allow cross posting of the same issues. I thank you for your understanding on this.

[Anonymous]

Sorry I wasn't sure which board this question belonged on - I'm new

[Anonymous]

Can't thank you enough for your reply! I found out my brother-in-law is dealing with the same issue so hopefully we both can be as fortunate as you were in getting those late payments removed from our report. 

So you didn't try sending a goodwill letter or deal with the Dept. of Ed. first? You went straight to the CRA's? I'm pretty new to all of this so in what way did you contact them to ask them to remove the late payment history with that request?

The loan rehab was completed in June/July of 2016.

[Anonymous]

I did online disputes with the CRAs, but I did them as soon as the rehab was complete and my loans were picked up.  I don't know if you will be as successful with it being over a year since the loan was completed, but it is possible.  If your new tradelines date back to when the loans were originated, they may be seen as a duplicate.  I believe when I disputed I did it as verifying information and that I was told the account would be deleted.