What to do when chargeoff/collection wont do a pay for delete?

[ScottL]

I have been rebuilding my credit for 2 years now. I have made all my payments on time on my mortgage, car and my credit cards.

The main thing keeping me from a good looking credit report, are 3 charge off/collection accounts. (Discover, RentDebt and TXU Electric)  All this occured years ago when I was going through a divorce. Got an apartment, wife begged me back, came back home and had to bail on my lease of the apartment and was a bad time financially as I had also just lost my job and additional bills were neglected.

Discover and Rent Debt both say they will take settlements. I think rentdebt may take a PFD only if i make a one time settlement payment, but will cost me abotu $2500 that i do not have at the moment. She said if i make payments, they will not delete it. But who knows, once paid off maybe they will?

Discover will take a settlement with payments. Not sure if they will delete afterwards or not though. I need to call them back and see. But if I recall, they said they couldnt guarntee it.

Then TXU electric is only $167, i called to pay it but they wont do a PFD and was rude about it. so i hung up and didnt pay it.

so my question is, if i start making payments to the 2 big ones and payoff the one small one. And they do not agree to do a PFD, when they become paid in full.  is there anything i can do at that point to have them removed? or am i still stuck with them for another 3 years or so?  once they report as paid and they do stay on there, will that improve my score at all?  these 3 accounts are really hurting my score and I feel like preventing me from a high 600s score or more and preventing me from taking that next step in credit for airline rewards, low rates, higher credit line accounts, etc.

PLEASE HELP i need advice on what to do.  would someone like Lexington Law Firm or someone like that be able to help?

[Duke84]

Not to be the bearer of bad news, but collection agencies and creditors don't have to remove the tradelines just because you settled with them. It's not something you're entitled to and not something they're willingly going to do.

Have you looked at your report and checked to make certain the charge-offs and collections aren't still reporting to the CRAs? If they are still reporting monthly, this could be preventing you from your goals.

I would start making the payments towards the bigger ones and pay off the small one quickly. Especially if they are still reporting to the bureaus. You should be prepared to see these accounts staying on your reports until they age off.

Lexington Law Firm won't be able to much for you that you can't do for yourself. But, perhaps if you are persistent with these accounts, they might goodwill or PFD once you pay them.

[bstone]

One thing to keep in mind though, once you start making payments you re-age the account, and I believe the seven years for it to fall off starts all over.  If they don't delete the debt you may drop your score even more.  How old are these?  Will they fall off naturally in a couple of years?  Might be best to ignore them and let them fall off if they won't guarantee a PFD.  JMTC.

[ScottL]

the only  credit reports I have are the ones from here on MYFICO website. I do not know what dates I am looking at, but here is what they say

Franklin Collections $167

Date Assigned 5/5/15 - but this is older than this. This must just be the date this collection agency got it. Its been through a few of them over the past couple years

RentDebt Collections  $3891

Date Assigned  2/9/12

Discover Charge Off  $5491

Last Activity 2/2011   Status Date 7/2015

I think they are all from about the same time, 2011-2012... but I am not sure the exact dates they would fall off. I am guessing another 3-4 years.

[Duke84]

I think the $167 collection will stay the full 7 years if you paid the collection and didn't get it deleted. It would be there until 2022. RentDebt until 2019, and Discover until 2018.

The clock for when these accounts would fall off are from the date of the first delinquency. This isn't to discredit bstone though. Acknowledgement of the debt very well could restart the clock.

Since Discover is a major creditor, I would think that if you don't pay them off, you may be waiting a very long time before they extend credit to you again.

[Anonymous]

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@bstone wrote:

One thing to keep in mind though, once you start making payments you re-age the account, and I believe the seven years for it to fall off starts all over.  If they don't delete the debt you may drop your score even more.  How old are these?  Will they fall off naturally in a couple of years?  Might be best to ignore them and let them fall off if they won't guarantee a PFD.  JMTC.

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That is entirely incorrect. NOTHING resets the 7.5 year reporting period. NOTHING.

[Anonymous]

I had a several chargeoffs for credit cards that i paid and they refused to PFD. I tried GW letters for about a month and they refused.

Then i opened cases with BBB and CFPB that portrayed the credit card companies in a negative light. They both deleted the tradelines as a 'courtesy'

[RobertEG]

Furnishers, be they creditors or debt collectors, agree, as part of their credit reporting agreements with the CRAs, to abide by the credit reporting procedures set forth by the CRAs in their common credit reporting manual, the "Credit Reporting Resource Guide" (c) CDIA.

An express and repeated policy in that manual is that furnishers should NOT delete prior reporting based on payment of the debt.

That is not a statutory prohibition, but is a policy provision set by the CRAs to enforce the completeness of the credit reports they sell.

Disputing the lack of deletion of a reported charge-off or collection based on payment of the debt is asking the CRAs to enforce a deletion that is directly contrary to their stated policy. 

Deletion based on payment of the debt is not a requirment of the CRA and lack of deletion is not a proper basis for a dispute of accuracy of that reporting.