The points go away but when do they come back?

Anonymous · ‎05-12-2008

Ok folks, this is my first post (to go along with the first time I decided to get serious about credit score/repair/management).

Here goes: Back in Dec. I realized that something needed to give, so I contacted student loan for deferment. It was granted over the phone, but it took many calls, tirades and blowups until April to actually get it in the SL system. Of course, since they had approved the deferment in December, I hadn't paid since then. So, SL people reported Dec, Jan, Feb, Mar payments as late/not paid. I finally got verification letter last week from SL and sent copy to the three bureaus with a statement about what happened.

February Ex score was 632. Signed up for Score Watch in April and saw it dropped to 540 thanks to "not paid" reporting by SL folks. Now, today I got a Score Watch notice that it went up 33 points.

SL changed reporting to "Paying as agreed", but FICO took 92 and only gave back 33! What gives?

haulingthescoreup · ‎05-12-2008

Hi, kyd70, welcome to the forums! I split your post off to start its own thread, because often people don't want to post onto these long threads when they go off-topic.

Who is your SL with? One thing that you'll find very quickly is in the world of credit scoring, things rarely happen in a vaccum.

We'd need to know a lot more about what else is on your reports, and what's going on with them: balance changes and so forth. But mainly, who holds your student loan. As you might have seen on other threads, Sallie Mae has temporarily (we hope) lost its mind, so a lot of its reporting is screwed up.

* Credit is a wonderful servant, but a terrible master. * Who's the boss --you or your credit?
FICO's: EQ 781 - TU 793 - EX 779 (from PSECU) - Done credit hunting; having fun with credit gardening. - EQ 590 on 5/14/2007

RobertEG · ‎05-12-2008

Kyd, from what you have said, it seems that these are the points You asked for a deferment of your SL, but it was not officially granted until the loan was already 120 days late.

When they finally agreed to defer the loan payments, you had already acquired a major derog of 120 days that has not yet been removed from your CR.

If this is all correct, then the key issue is not whether you are currenty in a paying as agreed status, it seems rather to be what will be done with the 120 day derog. Is the SL creditor agreeing to remove the derogs? That seems to be the issue here.

Anonymous · ‎05-14-2008

Who is your SL with? One thing that you'll find very quickly is in the world of credit scoring, things rarely happen in a vaccum.

SL was sold to Chase (CR still says Suntech, though) last year. It is a consolidation with my and my DW SL's. The total is $23,579. Basically, I received one of the consolidation ads in the mail and signed up just so I could get one bill.

Here is what the alert said:

Your FICO score may have gone up because the following factor is not hurting your FICO score as much as before:

You have balances on accounts that are past due.

Also, since I knew this was going to be a problem (couldn't come at a worse time since I need to refi before my rate goes up this summer!), I pressed Chase for a physical letter that acknowledged the deferment. Last week I mailed a copy of the letter and some update information to each bureau to see if I could get this straight on my own.

To be honest, I have no idea if alert is due to Chase's reporting or my CR dispute letter. I figure it was Chase's reporting, since I can't believe a bureaucracy like EX would move that quickly.

Anonymous · ‎05-14-2008

Is the SL creditor agreeing to remove the derogs?
RobertEG

As I stated above, I wrote dispute letters to all three bureaus to attempt to correct the problem. Chase acknowledges that the deferment began in December 2007.

Anonymous · ‎05-14-2008

BTW, it figures that my first post would be singled out and spun off into a separate thread.

Quick college story: Had a prof. that was a stickler for students being on time. 5 min. late and he shut the door and marked you absent. Well, after having some hallway chats, I show up as he is shutting the door. I stopped the door with my boot and pushed my way in. Prof. begins to recite class rules, blah, blah, blah. I responded that if I put my life on the line to get enough money to pay for this class, and thus pay his salary, it was no concern of his whether I showed up on time or not. The Army taught me enough about that (thanks, Uncle Sam!).

So, Prof. created the "Kyd70 rule". Students could show up whenever they wanted, but after 5 min. they would be marked absent (2 absences = failing grade in his class).

Just like this situation. Weird, special, off-the-wall circumstances find me like a heat-seeker. Sheesh!

Anyway, thanks for everyone who has something to add. I hope I can figure this credit thing out so I can teach my kids. It's been bad for years, but I'm determined to reach 700!

haulingthescoreup · ‎05-14-2008

@Anonymous wrote:

BTW, it figures that my first post would be singled out and spun off into a separate thread.

Quick college story: Had a prof. that was a stickler for students being on time. 5 min. late and he shut the door and marked you absent. Well, after having some hallway chats, I show up as he is shutting the door. I stopped the door with my boot and pushed my way in. Prof. begins to recite class rules, blah, blah, blah. I responded that if I put my life on the line to get enough money to pay for this class, and thus pay his salary, it was no concern of his whether I showed up on time or not. The Army taught me enough about that (thanks, Uncle Sam!).
So, Prof. created the "Kyd70 rule". Students could show up whenever they wanted, but after 5 min. they would be marked absent (2 absences = failing grade in his class).
Just like this situation. Weird, special, off-the-wall circumstances find me like a heat-seeker. Sheesh!

Anyway, thanks for everyone who has something to add. I hope I can figure this credit thing out so I can teach my kids. It's been bad for years, but I'm determined to reach 700!

Good luck on untangling the student loan deferment. And I hope you don't mind my splitting off your post. It's really hard to get good feedback when you ask a question on one of those long, long threads.

edit to add: just saw your siggy--great line! Those must have been jump boots you stuck in that closing door.

Message Edited by haulingthescoreup on 05-14-2008 01:12 PM

* Credit is a wonderful servant, but a terrible master. * Who's the boss --you or your credit?
FICO's: EQ 781 - TU 793 - EX 779 (from PSECU) - Done credit hunting; having fun with credit gardening. - EQ 590 on 5/14/2007

Anonymous · ‎05-14-2008

just saw your siggy--great line!

Thanks.

BTW, I have been paying all other bills on time. I have 8 active accounts. That's why the deep drop and shallow recovery is so frustrating (besides the timing).

Also, after reading all the notes about utilization... sorry Mr. President, but my stimulus check went straight to reducing that number. Well, most of it anyway :-(

I keep reading that homeownership is going to pay off one day, but all I see is an overgrown money-vac!

Oh and sorry the bureau reporting to Score Watch is EQ not EX.

RobertEG · ‎05-14-2008

I just reiterate. The issue seems to have nothing to do with any deferrment. the FICO issue is the derogs that accrued in the interim.

Anonymous · ‎05-15-2008

the FICO issue is the derogs that accrued in the interim.

Ok. So the question now is will CR bureaus accept my dispute letter with a copy of the form letter from SL that states that deferment dated back to December (after which came the derogs-as you put it)?

The derogs should never have been posted to the CRs.

Also, does anyone know how long it takes to get dispute letters resolved?