The practice of deletion of closed accounts by the CRAs is not addressed under the FCRA or federal regulations other than under section 628, and thus there is no specific date. Theoretically, they should never be deleted. However, the CRAs, for their own purposes, have enacted procedures to delete old accounts after a period of time that THEY consider to be appropriate.
What they seem to consider "appropriate" is a time after which they no longer have the responsibility to monitor a consumer's credit file in order to calculate when derogs can no longer be included in credit reports they issue. The CR exclusion periods under the various paragraphs of FCRA 605(a) range from 7-10 years (with the exception of tax liens, which if unpaid, can be reported forever). Those periods curiously coincide with the normal deletion dates used by the CRAs, giving credence to the conclusion that they delete when they no longer have statutory obligations, ignoring the detrimental effect on consumers that can result from such deletions.
Under FCRA 628, the federal banking agencies were required to have initiated rulemaking on the subject of disposal of credit report information back in 2005, but to my knowledge, no such rules have been proposed, let alone enacted.
