Hello All, I have no doubts you all can shed some light on my concern, so I thank you in advance!
So, the balance for my Pioneer charged-off account is suddenly being reported as $5,450 more than I ever owed. T The account was charged off in 2016 with a balance of $4,200 and this is what has always been reported. Off and on, over the past year, I have received settlment offers from the original creditor, which also show a balance of $4,200, but I could never afford to take the offers (wish I could). The most recent offer that I received with showed the accurate balance, which was about 2 months ago. Then last month, I received a collection notice from an outside collections agency, with a balance of $7000. I figured this was due to fees and interest from the collections agency.
Well, I finally have some money to make an offer and checked my FICO score simulator to see how paying it off will affect my score. I was surprised to see that the original account balance is now being reported as $9,650 (updated on 13 April), with a past due amount of $9,488! This change doesn't seem to have affected my credit score and my score actually went up 17 points since then. But I know it has to be affecting my debt to income ratio and am afraid of a sudden score drop eventually. All of the credit reports also now report this new balance. Now I'm not sure what to offer or pay.
Has this happened to anyone else? Or, could new balancd include interest, that the company is just now deciding to report? If so, is this legal? If not, is this something that I can (should) dispute or just leave it alone?
Any advice is greatly appreciated.
Thanks!
FICO - 674
Experian - 694
Equifax - 639
Trans Union - Who Knows???? (I depise them)
Thanks!
