Are closed accounts reported for 10 years?

[HiLine]

So many people have said that closed accounts are reported for 10 years that this has been taken for granted. But like many other rumors such as the Amex Green being easier to be approved for than the Amex PRG, this needs to be revisited some time since the accuracy of this little piece of info is very important for making credit decisions.

As far as I know, creditors are under no obligation to report tradelines that are closed; they do this voluntarily. If you close an account that has a $0 balance, you are at the mercy of the bank for how long the positive history of the tradeline will stay on your credit history. There is no guarantee they will keep reporting at all. It is my understanding that most banks report positvely closed accounts for several years, but the length of the period seems to fluctuate arbitrarily.

It has been brought to my attention that even a very influential sticky thread: http://ficoforums.myfico.com/t5/Credit-Cards/Closing-Credit-Cards/td-p/347190 quotes the 10 years length of time, and that has provided the basis for some posters on this board to close tradelines. I'm hoping to clear up this myth so we can make more informed decisions as well as advice in the future.

Any thoughts?

[Anonymous]

It depends on a lot of factors. The account can stay for up to 10 years, but only will stay on for as long as the lender decides to update it. Also, equifax and transunion seems to be pretty digilent with axing old accounts as compared to experian. Disputing a closed account without any delinquencies reported is almost guaranteed to make it fall off. For people whom are dumb enough to believe bumpage still works, it usually results in good closed accounts being removed instead as well.

[fittiger]

I thought once the accounts were closed and paid off, the creditor no longer reports to the CRA's on that account.  What would be the need to report on a closed out account, it won't change at that point?

I think it just remains for 10 years until the CRA's remove it at that point.   (speculative)

[jamesdwi]

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@fittiger wrote:

I thought once the accounts were closed and paid off, the creditor no longer reports to the CRA's on that account.  What would be the need to report on a closed out account, it won't change at that point?

I think it just remains for 10 years until the CRA's remove it at that point.   (speculative)

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the Credit reporting agency keeps reporting the account for up to 10 years whether or not the creditor actually updates. I have a TL that was for my BestBuy rewards MC I closed it during the transition to CapOne, HSBC never reported it closed, and CapOne isn't updating it because the account is marked closed in their system. So since 6/2012 when the card was closed. It still reports on my credit report as having a $59 balance, which is the AF that was due when I closed the account, the on-line system shows its closed zero balance, since the card has no lates and shows open in good standing I'm just going to let it age untill CapOne gets around to closing it, and then the 10 year time clock starts.

[GatorGuy]

I would love more information on this as well. I would be surprised if creditors do continue reporting a closed account for 10 years.

[flan]

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@GatorGuy wrote:

I would love more information on this as well. I would be surprised if creditors do continue reporting a closed account for 10 years.

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They don't; it's closed, there's not supposed to be anything to report.  In general, what creditors report is merely the current information.  They do not report what the balance was last month, let alone the whole life of the account  The only time historical data is supposed to be sent is if they're correcting an error. 

(And, yes, I've got a bunch of old closed tradelines on my reports.  Some have been updated to list the bank that acquired the bank that issued the credit; some haven't.) 

[parakleet]

I just pulled my EX report - under the "Status Details" section for all of the closed TLs, it says "This account is scheduled to continue on record until ______" and it has the date that's 10 yrs from the last reported date in the blank. 

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymous wrote:
It depends on a lot of factors. The account can stay for up to 10 years, but only will stay on for as long as the lender decides to update it. Also, equifax and transunion seems to be pretty digilent with axing old accounts as compared to experian. Disputing a closed account without any delinquencies reported is almost guaranteed to make it fall off. For people whom are dumb enough to believe bumpage still works, it usually results in good closed accounts being removed instead as well.

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That's why I don't close any of my old accounts, and the b* indeed works for me. 

[Anonymous]

So you are saying it works for u when it stopped working for almost everyone else since 1-2 years ago.....?

And the only reason why I used the word "almost" is because there's still a small number of people on other boards that claim it works, contrary to evidence, and at the same time refusing to provide any form of evidence to back their claims up. So their credibility alone is a big question mark.

To make myself clearer, this is what i read as well: some people who tried bumpage might see some inquiries getting bumped off temporarily, but those inquiries seem to still show up in the Leander's copy of the CR, and usually the bumped off inquiries will be back again after a couple days to couple weeks. Timing can vary.

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymous wrote:
So you are saying it works for u when it stopped working for almost everyone else since 1-2 years ago.....?

And the only reason why I used the word "almost" is because there's still a small number of people on other boards that claim it works, contrary to evidence, and at the same time refusing to provide any form of evidence to back their claims up. So their credibility alone is a big question mark.

To make myself clearer, this is what i read as well: some people who tried bumpage might see some inquiries getting bumped off temporarily, but those inquiries seem to still show up in the Leander's copy of the CR, and usually the bumped off inquiries will be back again after a couple days to couple weeks. Timing can vary.

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B*  is just not as easy as it was several years ago, it still works for the overwhelming majority of people as far as I know.

Yes, some may bounce back on TU, while other inquiries don't, and still, according to what I see, a relatively small portion of people see these things.  As of the lender see different CR with you? I havn't heard of any news about this. I will just ask them how many inquiries they see next time I recon for something. 

I do see about ten inquireis fall off from my TU since I started the exercise last month. Not on EQ yet, because it will take about 60 days to effect.