How can a debt which was paid off thru a settlement be listed as a potentially negative item on CR?
Answers:
This is something I have been trying to warn people about for many months.
Your credit report is designed to reflect your past credit history. If you made late payments, had a debt charged off or go into collections, this will be show on your credit report, along with the credit balance.
Once you have paid off this debt, all the creditor is required to do is show that the debt was "paid", but all of that other negative informatin will still remain. It's still going to be a bad item on your history.
Funny how the collection agent neglected to tell you that, huh?
Now the bad news.you are going to find it extremely difficult for them to delete this information. They now have your money and you have no leverage over them.
Lesson learned...before you pay a collection agent a dime, get them to agree IN WRITING to delete the entry from your history once the debt is paid. Yes they can do it...no, it's not illegal. Trust me, I've investigated all of this, and there are some "professional" collection agents here on Yahoo who have confirmed it. They just don't like me passing on trade secrets.
All you can do now is try to politely ask them if they will help you restore your credit by deleting the time.but don't hold your breath a CA will ever do that once they have your money.
Most likely because it shows as "Settled for less than the full amount".
While it still shows as paid with a $0 balance, everybody who looks at your credit knows that you did not pay the full amount owed.
Because you made a settlement and did not pay the full balance. If you had paid balance in full and not the settlement amount you would receive positive mark on CR.
no because u settled and u didn't pay when it was due..
This will remain on your credit report for 7 years. Usually when you get to a settlement offer stage, the account has been seriously delinquent and/or charged off. If that was the case, your credit is reflecting your payment history regardless of whether you paid off the account in full or not. All you can do at this point is wait it out. With each passing month, the affect that this account has on your report will diminish. Best thing you can do going forward is to keep your revolving credit balances less than 50% of your available credit line and make all your payments on time. Eventually your score will get better. Hang in there!
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