Merrick Bank - Charge Off Because of Returned Payments

[Anonymous]

Hi All,

New to the community but in need of your thoughts.

I'm rebuilding and have three subprime cards to assist in this effort: Merrick Bank Visa (opened 7/16); First Premier Mastercard (opened 9/16) and Total Visa (opened 9/16). I have never missed a payment with any card.  

I recently changed banks so I reset the payment account for all of the cards including the Merrick Visa.  In April 2017, three attempted payments to Merrick Bank were returned because of an administrative error with the routing and account numbers at the new bank.  I called Merrick Bank to advise them of the issue and I believed it was resolved.  Two days after my call, I recevied a letter from Merrick Bank indicating that they were charging off my account because they were not confident that I could pay the balance.  Needless to say, the charge off tanked all of my scores by 35 points.  What can I do to fight this?  I opened the card 7/16 with a limit of $700, Merrick doubled my limit 3/17 to $1400 and charged the account off 4/17.

Any advice to what to put in a letter to Merrick or the CRA is appreciated. 

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Hi All,

New to the community but in need of your thoughts.

I'm rebuilding and have three subprime cards to assist in this effort: Merrick Bank Visa (opened 7/16); First Premier Mastercard (opened 9/16) and Total Visa (opened 9/16). I have never missed a payment with any card.  

I recently changed banks so I reset the payment account for all of the cards including the Merrick Visa.  In April 2017, three attempted payments to Merrick Bank were returned because of an administrative error with the routing and account numbers at the new bank.  I called Merrick Bank to advise them of the issue and I believed it was resolved.  Two days after my call, I recevied a letter from Merrick Bank indicating that they were charging off my account because they were not confident that I could pay the balance.  Needless to say, the charge off tanked all of my scores by 35 points.  What can I do to fight this?  I opened the card 7/16 with a limit of $700, Merrick doubled my limit 3/17 to $1400 and charged the account off 4/17.

Any advice to what to put in a letter to Merrick or the CRA is appreciated. 

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was the error (highlighted) Merrick Banks fault or yours?  My answer would depend on yours

I forgot to say WELCOME   (sorry)

[Anonymous]

Mine, there were leading zeros in my new credit union member number that I inlcuded in my bill pay that I should not have.

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Mine, there were leading zeros in my new credit union member number that I inlcuded in my bill pay that I should not have.

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Okay Doky...

Call Merrick and once again explain the mistake (be very humble) and offer to send bank letter to prove the money was there if it hadn't been for a typo on your part there would have been no problem of payment going thru.

If the agent says..NO

then write to them, explain again how it was a error on your part not intentional to avoid payment "as my past payment history has shown" and include a letter from bank stating what date opened and balance was available on the dates that Merrick tried (make sure you put your SSN, Acct #, addy and your full name on letter) .

I can't promise they will re-open, but your chance are good when you take responsibility and show remorse for a one time error

Good Luck!

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the advice.  I just tried to call again and it looks like they have transferred the account to a debt collector already.  They didn't waste anytime...

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Thanks for the advice.  I just tried to call again and it looks like they have transferred the account to a debt collector already.  They didn't waste anytime...

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Oh man...well what you can do from here is contact CAs and offer to "pay for delete" this is if you pay balance then they will delete from your credit report. But first you have to wait and let them contact you.  The reason being, CAs pick these up for pennies on the dollar and they may offer you a "settlement" amount (witch is less then what the bill is if you don't pay it) but please note, Merrick could have added a couple of hundred for returned check fee, over the limit fees when they closed you down

but, if they sent it to debt collector and haven't sold it off, that can be an ok thing because if you pay it off then Merrick might let you back in after a year or so

[Anonymous]

Charge offs generally occur after 4 missed payments in a row over 4 months.  How many months were you behind?

[Anonymous]

None, thats the thing.  I was up to date, completely curent and they charged off my card.

[Anonymous]

File a complaint with the CPFB immediately -- the law requires that banks charge-off accounts that are 180 days delinquent but there is zero reason for a bank to charge-off an account with one late payment.

[rmduhon]

If the debt collector isn't reporting yet get an agreement to not report if you pay. If they aren't reporting a PFD won't work because there won't be anything to delete. Do this as soon as possible to keep it from going on your reports.