(I put this on Understanding FICO Scoring because of the crazy score bump.)
OK, this is only going to happen if you have the world's most old and boring credit reports, as does DH. The only late he has ever had in his life was on a gas card that we were trying to close because our mail kept being stolen from our mailbox. (This was back in the days of snail mail, children.) His current open accounts are our mortgage, two CC's both at $0, and a line of credit that he didn't even realize that he had, also at $0.
You might have seen on another forum that there was a bogus medical collection put on his EQ and TU (not EX) reports because DD#1 was out of state and had to go to a local ER, and the physician's billing service goobered up their end. Insurance wouldn't pay them, although they did pay the hospital itself, and instead of fixing it, the billers just turned him over to collections, and we never even knew.
I got the insurance company (3 cheers for United Healthcare) to pay the bill, almost 6 years later, even though they weren't the insurance company we had in 2002. I filed, ummm, HE filed a dispute with EQ and TU as paid by insurance. Two weeks ago, I pulled his EQ, and the CA had updated the report to make it look like he had paid them, and showed it as current and paid. I found out the next steps, and they were on my to-do list for this weekend.
But in the meantime, the disputes that I/he had filed were coming up on their deadlines, and we got the e-mail from EQ today, and the CA is GONE!!!! And here's what happened to his EQ:


(sorry, don't know where the imageshack link came from, but that's who I use)
No news from TU yet, with three days to go, but I know what to do if they validate the collection, silly TU. So those of you who are fighting collections that shouldn't be there, keep fighting! Even if you only get 10 points back, it's worth it, and it's possible that it could be a whole lot more.
* Credit is a wonderful servant, but a terrible master. * Who's the boss --you or your credit?
FICO's: EQ 781 - TU 793 - EX 779 (from PSECU) - Done credit hunting; having fun with credit gardening. - EQ 590 on 5/14/2007