@Anonymous wrote:
Dear Mr. Moynihan,
I am writing to you today regarding my credit card account #XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX which I had while I was an undergraduate student at [prior university]. I opened my first credit card account with Bank of America (BoA) to further prove my value to you as a consumer. I have been a Bank Of America cardholder since 2014 and I have had great experiences with my accounts. It was brought to my attention by a Bank of America customer service representative that I was significantly late on payments on the credit card previously mentioned. Despite my unfavorable circumstances and financial hardships, I gathered my outside funds and immediately paid off the balance of $536.59, in full, and closed the account, at the discretion of my parents’ request. Recognizing the impact this would have on my credit worthiness, I pulled my first credit report. My credit report currently shows several late payments from June 2019 to November 2019, including a 30-day, two 60-day, two 90-day, and a whopping 120-day late payment. Thus, I am writing to kindly request that you consider making a "goodwill" adjustment to your reporting to the three credit agencies, in regards to the late payments.
While being a student in chemical engineering, recent accounting courses I’ve taken at [XXX Community College] have taught me the importance of one’s credit report and financial performance. A key lesson I learned is how creditors evaluate a credit profile based on one’s collateral, income, payment history, character, and other factors. With some education in personal finance, I understood that poor financial management and bad credit rating can affect one’s ability to obtain a mortgage or credit lines.
Based on my long-standing payment history, I would like you to consider removing the late payments from my credit report. During this period, I withdrew out of my prior university to transfer to another university, which resulted in insufficient funds from making payments for outstanding fees, loss of campus housing and my work-study jobs. Last month, I realized that the late payments were not a good indicator of my credit worthiness. Thankfully, an appointment with [XXXX], a BoA relationship manager, introduced me to Better Money Habits, a financial education seminar that is helping me focus on evaluating financial decisions, developing a personalized blueprint for my financial goals, and practicing better financial habits. Such habits include signing up for automatic payments that I intend to apply for future BoA credit lines. With having to soon apply for housing, my credit report will be looked at and final decisions will depend on my credit history. I ask you for a courtesy gesture on erasing these late payments from my credit reports.
I would like to stress that I am not disputing this information and what is currently being reported is accurate. I accept that I have missed payments and that I take full responsibility. I’ve had exceptional experiences in the past and seek to continue a long relationship with BoA as a responsible cardholder. I would like to thank you for your time and consideration of my request, and I look forward to your reply.
Sincerely,
Deus-Ex_Veritas
Good job posting this up here. My initial impressions:
* the tone is pretty good: not whiny; not entitled; is respectful;
* the argument is missing: there's no compelling reason to remove the lates;
* the message is unfocused: quite a bit of redundancy;
* a complete rewrite is in order.
A couple of things I learned from my GW experience with WF that I expect are (mostly, if not entirely) transferable to other lenders:
* some/many lenders carte blanche policy is to make no GW adjustments although they will consider requests that involve a "catastrophe." This catastrophe is often (some more loosely than others) defined as a naturally occuring disaster (think: earthquake, hurricane, etc).
* many/most lenders standard rebuttal is "we are required by contractual (legal) agreement to ONLY report accurate information to the CRA and, as such, we are unable to honor your request ..."
I learned this by starting my GW campaign with a series of phone calls. Once escalated to the Executive Office I got a very nice lady who kindly explained to me why my situation did not apply. No, it didn't. But I learned how I would need to reshape my situation subsequently.
So I would suggest in your rewrite you consider the need to overcome these two obstacles: 1) they don't want to help you; 2) they will argue "our hands are tied."
So your task is two-fold: 1) Untie their hands; 2) Make them want to help you.
Your odds of success will be improved if you can incorporate a "catastrophe." And then add to that a lovely "asking" tone, plus the rebuttal that "I would never ask you to report inaccurate information to the CRA in violation of your agreement" only that "you not report anything at all." Which, by the way, they frequently do without provocation.
A couple of other tips:
* keep it short & clean (edit, edit, edit);
* tell no (discernable) lies -- you need to come across as fully authentic;
* blow no smoke up their a_____;
* make your case emotionally without sounding pathetic;
* win the argument of why you should get GW relief.
Good luck.
