Experian alerted to balance higher than limit—then REFUSED balance dispute
Here is the alert I received a couple nights ago:
Potentially Negative Information
An item is “potentially negative” when a creditor reports that you have not met the terms of your agreement with them, which may include late
payments, accounts that have been charged off, accounts sent to collection, bankruptcies, liens, judgments, etc.
Alert Date Business Name Balance Date Balance Amount Status Date Payment Status1/12/2007 TARGET NB ---- ---- ---- Bank Card / Credit Card Over Credit Limit
The saved page:
1-12-07-Experian-alert-over-limit.pdf
Expecting more aggravation, I couldn’t even get myself to look at it until yesterday and I figured it was about the Target account. The Napster recurring $10 payment was declined a few days ago and I had quickly made the minimum payment. The interest put me over the limit by $4.
Here is how Experian reports the account:
1-13-07-Experian-Target-over-limit-pub.pdf
NOTE: Have a close look at this file if you are currently subscribing to Experian’s CreditExpert credit monitoring.
Most subscribers do NOT know that they’re missing about half data unless they go to submit an online dispute and click on PRINT YOUR REPORT to get the FULL report.
Experian reports the BALANCES for the last 15 months, the so important Date of Status, the scheduled deletion date for closed and derog accounts, previous investigation results and all kinds of info NOT on the report you get as the CreditExpert “full report.”
So, I went to dispute the balance and Experian promptly REFUSED my dispute:
So, first they alerted me to the potentially NEGATIVE reporting, and then they REFUSED my dispute!
Why are they refusing the dispute?
They WANT as much negative info on the report as LONG as possible because it is more PROFITABLE to sell reports with LOW scores.
If you looked at the Target reporting linked above, you can see that I’ve been carrying a balance close to the limit for several months now. Building a house is expensive and I definitely need to get a mortgage ASAP.
I plan on applying for a mortgage within the next few weeks and OBVIOUSLY need the best possible scores. Now is a good time because I just paid off one of the Cap One accounts, but as the building continues, that card will be maxed out again soon.
BTW, the Experian PLUS score is 692, while the FICO scores for the mortgage are probably in the low 600s. MY TU FICO is 623 with NO derogs—other than the high B/L ratio and the total amount owed on revolving accounts.
So Experian refuses the balance disputes and tells me that I have to wait until Target updates again around 2/11. And how bizarre is it that they even HAVE the option to submit a balance dispute when they refuse it anyway?
I tried it for the paid off Capital One account. The current reported balance is $6,222. I input $100 for the new balance, the dispute was again refused as with Target. I was hoping that maybe they’d process disputes for larger differences between the current and new balance.
Next, I tried the option: account paid in full
I was thrilled to not get the intial decline, only to get a new reason to refuse my factual dispute:
Error
We have already investigated this information, and the creditor has verified that it is correct. If you still have a question about it, you may want to contact the creditor, or if you have additional relevant information, click here.
1-13-07--Experian-CapOne-Kmart-dispute-refusal-pub.pdf
According to the Experian report:
Status Details:
This item was verified and updated on May 2006.
JUST GREAT!
Sue, people, sue. You know ** I ** will.
Time wasted: well over an hour.
It’s not that I’m really slow to click on links, but obviously I had to save all the relevant pages, the report, etc. so that I will prevail in court.
Posted by Christine on 01/14/2007 at 11:00 AM
2003 Suit (appealed, Experian filed credit reports on PACER) • Experian - countless violations • (0) Comments • Permalink
