stolen cell-phone fiasco... not reported?

[Anonymous]

Hi,

I have FICO around 740.

About a year ago my cell phone was stolen, 6200 (you're reading that right) racked up on it in a short period of time before I reported it missing, a T-Mobile holding me accountable since it was before the reported date. I'm a student and I don't really have the money, so I've been ignoring their daily calls. However it's been a year and they still haven't reported it to collections. Are they not going to? If they do, am I screwed or does cell phone stuff not affect you that much (a few adults have told me this)? Advice?

(PS Has anyone ever had the debt erased in a similar situation? These calls began within 10 minutes of it being stolen, if you can believe that, so well within 24hrs which seems a reasonable grace period to me. )

Stephanie

[Jazzzy]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Hi,

I have FICO around 740.

About a year ago my cell phone was stolen, 6200 (you're reading that right) racked up on it in a short period of time before I reported it missing, a T-Mobile holding me accountable since it was before the reported date. I'm a student and I don't really have the money, so I've been ignoring their daily calls. However it's been a year and they still haven't reported it to collections. Are they not going to? If they do, am I screwed or does cell phone stuff not affect you that much (a few adults have told me this)? Advice?

(PS Has anyone ever had the debt erased in a similar situation? These calls began within 10 minutes of it being stolen, if you can believe that, so well within 24hrs which seems a reasonable grace period to me. )

Stephanie

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Cell phone bills affect you just like any other bill. If they become a collection account, they hit your score just like any other collection account.

I don't know why this hasn't hit your credit reports yet. It likely will.

For this amount of money, you may want to talk to a lawyer. If you are a student, your school likely has free legal aid for you. You may be able to talk to an attorney for free. Check it out. This isn't likely to go away by ignoring it.

[MarineVietVet]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Hi,

I have FICO around 740.

About a year ago my cell phone was stolen, 6200 (you're reading that right) racked up on it in a short period of time before I reported it missing, a T-Mobile holding me accountable since it was before the reported date. I'm a student and I don't really have the money, so I've been ignoring their daily calls. However it's been a year and they still haven't reported it to collections. Are they not going to? If they do, am I screwed or does cell phone stuff not affect you that much (a few adults have told me this)? Advice?

(PS Has anyone ever had the debt erased in a similar situation? These calls began within 10 minutes of it being stolen, if you can believe that, so well within 24hrs which seems a reasonable grace period to me. )

Stephanie

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I'm not sure if I understand what you are saying. How soon after the phone was stolen did you report it?

[Anonymous]

I had a similar situation. My cell carrier told me my contract was up and I got a new carrier. Then they told me they were mistaken and I had six weeks left. Then they refused to cancel the account. Then they threw me over to the collection agencies. I had no credit history to begin with and when I tried to pull a FICO Experian and all the others told me I had no FICO. Experian said I had no significant positive or negative credit history. So the point is an old cell phone bill certainly did not affect my FICO score.

[drkaje]

You'll likely ned a police report.

[llecs]

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@drkaje wrote:

You'll likely ned a police report.

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+1.

ETA....Dooooh...the thread got bumped..

[RobertEG]

Your situation screams for using the identity theft provisions of the FCRA.

File a police report, as recommended.  Why?  Because that is needed to open up all of the protections afforded by the FCRA.

Once you have the police report, which the FCRA consideres an identity theft report, you can:

1. Send a copy to the creditor, and demand under FCRA 609(e) a copy of all business records in their possession related to any transactions made on the account.

That gives you records to dispute that they were authorized by you.

2. Send a copy to the CRA and require them to block the information asserted to be related to the identity theft from your credit report under the provisions of FCRA 605B.

The 605B block will also prevent any sale, transfer, or referral for collection of the debt while the block is in place.  FCRA 615(f).

3.  If a debt collector ever reports (assuming they referred it for collection prior to your 605B block) you can also, under the provisions of FCRA 615(g), send them a copy and compel their disclosure of all information in their possession that you would otherwise be entitled to if you had filed a dispute with them.  It allows you to bypass the normal FCRA dispute process, and thus avoid a dispute flag on your CR.

File a police report, and enter the identity theft process.