Credit Reports... what are they good for anyway
Sometime last year, Nick tried selling his laptop on eBay. Someone bid on it for $1500, which I thought was odd, considering that was the full value when brand new. The guy was located within the US, but didn't have PayPal. He instead offered to send payment through a website that will authorize payment and then cut a check to the seller. Nick and I read through it and it seemed legit. Fast forward, we got the check and deposited it in my bank account (of which I had added Nick onto at that time). I was formerly banking with Washington Mutual, and nothing was said, everything was fine. 30 days later ~ WM informs us that the funds cannot be traced back to the origin and that our account is now negative $1500. I was beyond pissed ~ in my opinion banks should have a better way of checking into this. The funds were available and nothing was said for a full month. I would rather not have the funds available and be told they are waiting to research the origin/actual availability. No such thing. Of course the money was long gone at this point, we had needed the money to begin with back then. So fee upon fee was charged to our account, because of course other bills also cleared and had been sent before we were informed our account was overdrawn. It was just a ridiculous process. The only 'lucky' part of this is that Nick's laziness came in handy - he had never shipped out the laptop. He had planned on doing so, but was extremely lazy about it. Thank God.I kept trying to fight this, to no avail. I understand the bank's POV, but I still don't think the process is right. Imagine if the laptop had been sent out. How are we supposed to know if a check, any check, is good, whether from eBay or our employer, etc.? That SHOULD be the bank's job, and we shouldn't be punished for that. Anyhow, the account went to a collections agency, ER Solutions, to collect the debt. I was angry that I hadn't made any headway with my complaint and that they sent it to collections as though I was some scumbag. I was even angrier that this would effect my credit. I gave up and paid the agency quickly.
My gripe is that this is listed on my credit report(as paid), and recently has caused credit cards and other lenders to deny me, despite an otherwise good credit report. Now my question is, why did I bother paying this debt if it was going to effect me negatively anyhow? I may as well have taken the $1500 and paid off one of my credit cards, and just had it listed as negative anyway! I actually wrote to Bankrate.com (one of the columns) to ask if there is anything I can do. Nick suggested I can call the credit bureaus and have this removed, but I don't think that is possible? Isn't that what it's there for, so companies see everything you have/have done? I just don't think it's right.
My gripe on Nick's behalf, and others who have not so great credit, is when a company you defaulted on 7 years ago sells your account to a new agency, which tries to collect from you. This debt is then listed twice (or more) on your credit report, negatively impacting your credit. Again, this should be illegal. How can you be punished twice or more for a debt you only incurred once? It's just not right. Due to this, Nick actually stopped caring, he was trying to rebuild his credit and lost the motivation because this happened to him twice. He just gave up. (the medical bills from his knee surgery that Worker's Comp kept messing up and not paying didn't help either). I don't condone that, but I can certainly understand. We are just working on my credit ~ and this collection thing has me really fired up.
posted by Karen @ 6:18 PM
3 Comments:
hmm. sorry about all the problems.
I believe it would have been better had you try a different approach with the collection agency. I'm not sure what steps u should take, but I could have sworn.. the first thing you should do.. is not immediately pay them, but see what your options are. (In terms of negotiating with them to put a better status on your credit report, in return you'll promptly pay off the debt in full)
I would suggest you head over to http://creditboards.com/ to check out ways to repair your credit report.
a debt should not show up twice, it may show up in a different status under a report (or show up differently on one agency to another) though. what you should do is pull your report from each of the perspective 3 agency, and take a look at duplicate, mistakes, or possible errors. and dispute them. you can do this all online.
by law, if you're denied credit for any reason, you have the right to get a free report from whatever agency they used to base that denial. so say if Discover denied you a credit card, you can go to experian.com and request a free report online.
but yeah there's lots of steps you can take to repair your credit history short term.. but to really fix it takes long term. dont give up, it may seem like a major hassle.. and it may seem like a great idea to just focus on one person.. but it will never hurt to have two people with high credit score, or good credit history.. when it comes time to get that house.
good luck. i highly recommend reading the creditboards.com forum though, you should go over the "newbie" section first, then eventually you can post up individual questions to see what you can do.
I'm with you. Especially with the new "we don't need a paper check anymore" law banks should be able to know very quickly whether or not a check is going to clear. (Gotta love the bank fees if you try to cash a check that SOMEBODY ELSE has insuffient funds for!) I'm to the point where I only take checks from people if I know where they live! :) Good luck with the credit stuff. Yuck!
Thanks for your comments ~ I am now sticking by your theory Ruth, and only accepting checks from those I know. We have also stopped using eBay. It can be a great outlet, but unfortunately there are many scammers out there and we're not willing to take our chances.
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