@tricie17 wrote:Several of these communication companies keep their accounts open until paid in full. If you remember your account information, try entering your account and pay a modest amount until paid off. After all, if you are honestly trying to pay, this is an option. Companies want to be paid regardless of how you do it. Once paid, you know the rest. If your account is closed you may have no choice but to pay.
Jefferson Capital and then Unfin are Junk Debt Buyers. Jefferson buys debts from Verizon, Sprint, Comcast etc. for pennies on the dollar. This debt got too old, likely past SOL, and they resold it to Unfin. Paying anything to Verizon is a black hole as they sold this debt and wrote it off long ago.
The OP stated that this all started in 2011 with the loss of her Husband. We don't know yet when the last payment was made. This could not only be past SOL but past the 7 year reporting period.
@spiritcraft1 The statement is a solution to wanting to remove this from continuing to report on credit report. Also stated was having 4 more years to drop from report which is monumental when cleaning up credit. Junk debt collectors still can collect and cause havoc. If removal is possible that is great. Personally if I was that established I would however think about leaving this alone but, removing is better for some people.
Starting Score: 544
@tricie17 wrote:@spiritcraft1 The statement is a solution to wanting to remove this from continuing to report on credit report. Also stated was having 4 more years to drop from report which is monumental when cleaning up credit. Junk debt collectors still can collect and cause havoc. If removal is possible that is great. Personally if I was that established I would however think about leaving this alone but, removing is better for some people.
I think the stated date was when Jefferson put it on her report, not when she stopped paying verizon. That has to be sooner than 2019.
But regardless, Jefferson is listed on her report and they no longer have the debt since they resold it to Unfin. Verizon has nothing to do with it any longer. I don't think Jefferson should have this listed as they no longer own the debt.
@musicalmom wrote:It shows it opened June 2019 on my report. I don't know if that's older or not? I still have about 4 years for it to be removed.
You're looking at the collection open date, which has NOTHING to do with the DOFD, or date of first delinquency. The collection open date is merely when Unifin acquired the account and first reported it. The DOFD is the date for when you first missed a payment, went delinquent, and never got current again. Do you know when that first missed payment was? I'd assume it was sometime in 2011/2012, unless you were able to keep up for a while afterwards. If you don't know this date, look on your credit reports from annualcreditreport.com.
@musicalmom wrote:I get what you are saying but do not know the answer. I pulled my TU on annual credit report dot com. Under accounts with adverse action, it says Jefferson, not Verizon. It says placed for collection on June 3, 2019. It does say the estimated time it will be removed is May 2023. Perhaps I'll just wait it out.
If you by chance had any old bills, you could also figure it out yourself. But if we assume the date on the Jefferson Capital TL is correct, then that would put your DOFD sometime around 2016.
You could wait it out, but you run the risk of the debt being resold to another CA that won't pay for delete. Also, depending on your state's SOL, they may still be able to sue you.
So is Unifin reporting on your credit reports, or is it only Jefferson Capital?
Okay, so then Verizon is out of the picture. Jefferson owns the debt and has hired Unifin to collect. The good news is Jefferson Capital deletes their TL once settled or paid in full, as I mentioned above. The bad news is they (Unifin, their collector) seem to not want to negotiate. Have you tried calling Jefferson Capital and negotiating with them directly?
Also, despite Unifin's 2019 open date, it would NOT remain 7 years. It would still have to follow the 7 year fall off period of the original DOFD, which seems to be 2016. Thus, Unifin would also fall off May 2023 regardless of payment or not. But like I said, waiting it out is risky for many reasons.