Wells fargo charge-off negotiating help

[Anonymous]

Long story short...I have a wells fargo charge-off from 2012 for 840$. The account is still with them, has not been sent to collections. I am banking with them at the moment, so it does show up in online banking with options to settle.
1. Settle for 50% in one payment or 6 payments and they will update with CRA as "paid, settled for less"
2. Pay it in full in one payment or 6 payments and the will update it as "paid in full"
My question is what is my best option as far as influence on my credit report is.
I can not pay it in full right now to consider PFD and I've read that WF does not really do it.
Will they consider a GW to delete after i pay it off in full paying for example 50$ a week. (Since I've been banking with them for about 4 years now)
Maybe someone had experience with them and can help me with advice how to negotiate my options.
I am planning to give them a call some time this week and make arrangements before account went to collections.

[chris6291]

I would try the WF credit department's EO... The fact that you are still a customer helps quite a bit, even if it's a chking account. I would write a GW to the EO and try to explain the situation at the time and how grateful you are to WF for giving you a chance and whatnot (nice stuff like that). If they say no, send it many times and don't give up. I wouldn't pay them a dime until I got the "right" person that "hooks" you up with PFD in monthly payments....

[RobertEG]

You never know in your future quests for credit when the issue of having an unpaid, delinquent debt may come up.

If they wont do a PFD, then consider what your expected credit needs will be between now and when the CO will become excluded from your credit report.

It might still be beneficial to pay, even though you will get no score boost, if you will be applying for credit, such as a mortgage loan, that traditionally requires the satisfactin of any unpaid, delinquent debt before their approval of a mortgage loan.

For the determination of when it will become excluded from your credit report should you do nothing, you need to know the DOFD that preceded their charge-off, and then add the exclusion period of no later than 7 years plus 180 days.

After that point, credit report exclusion will become moot, and you can likely get an even lower settlement agreement.

[Anonymous]

I would prefer to pay it, aiming for PFD. If they refuse, will still pay, just which option is better for my credit... to settle or pay in full.

[RobertEG]

Purely from a credit history perspective, it is preferable to pay in full UNLESS you can get a settlement AND their agreement not to report paid/settled for less.

Neither will remove the derogs from your credit report, so wont direclty improve your score.

However, both will discharge the debt.

If you settle for less, they have the option of reporting that fact to the CRA by way of a settled for less special comment.

That is never a favorable comment in your credit report, as it informs others that you have a past practice of not paying your entire obligated debt.

That means the prior creditor took a loss in dealing with you, and that could affect any decision as to whether to extend new credit.

If you cannot obtain a PFD, next best thing is to obtain a settlement for less along with their agreement not to make any reporting of settled for less to the CRAs.

The account will then look the same in a manual review as if it had been paid in full.

[Anonymous]

Thank you, I have contacted wells fargo and set up payments for every week, so I will be done with it by the end of this year. Once paid will try gw letter. They refused to do pfd, but I still decided to go ahead and pay it off in full before they gave it to collections and considering how much it hurts mine and husband's CS since it was a joint account.