Malfunction with auto pay, dinged on credit score, anything I can do?

[Anonymous]

We had auto pay set up on one of our lesser use CCs and it stopped working one month, we're not exactly sure why but the amount owed was so small the bank didn't alert us or even charge us a late fee. Well we paid it off as soon as realized auto pay had stopped working but the lateness was already reported on our credit. I called the bank and they said they had to report it as late to the credit agencies even if they didn't consider it late enough to fine us, according to fed law.

Is there anything I can do to get this removed from my report? I'm really ticked the bank didn't at least call us before doing this but they claim they were obliged under the law and can't help resolve it.

[Anonymous]

they wouldn't report a one-month delinquency

[Anonymous]

Well they did and claim they're required to by law

[Anonymous]

Credit card late payments work differently than other late payments. Your credit reports always show up-to-date payment records for each credit card. For payments to other types of vendors, the report shows something only if the vendor chooses to report, and presumably most vendors would not bother reporting very small delinquencies, and not before attempting to collect.

[Anonymous]

Anyhow, I am not certain there is a solution. The bank should have called you when they noticed the late payment to get it resolved. But once there's a late payment, I'm not sure what they would report to the credit agency to fix it. If you look at a credit report, for credit cards it shows your delinquent balance by month regardless of whether you have a delinquent balance. Since there technically was a balance, I'm not sure what the bank could do at this point to help you other than to lie and say there never was a balance, which isn't true.

One would hope that credit agencies would not treat a trivial credit card delinquency the same, as, say, missing a mortgage payment. But who knows?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:One would hope that credit agencies would not treat a trivial credit card delinquency the same, as, say, missing a mortgage payment. But who knows?

They do not. In fact, when you apply for a serious loan (like a mortgage), the lender will not simply look at a mathematical score: they will see the details. The mortgage processor [a human] evaluates those.

[Anonymous]

Bullshit. We were denied a mortgage because Verizon reported one late payment four years ago. It was my final bill on a closed account, and the bill was never forwarded. The total was lass than $40, but it killed my credit score because I don't have a lot of other credit.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Bullshit. We were denied a mortgage because Verizon reported one late payment four years ago. It was my final bill on a closed account, and the bill was never forwarded. The total was lass than $40, but it killed my credit score because I don't have a lot of other credit.

Not bullshit. Sorry, your mortgage processor looked at your credit history and saw a bill that wasn't paid -- not a credit card payment that was 30 days late. Very different.

[Anonymous]

OP here, it's a relief to know they don't just look at the score but I'd still like to try to resolve this somehow. I'm going to write the credit agencies and let them know it was a glich in the autopay, the account is paid in full now, and my own bank doesn't even think this is significant enough to bother charging me a late fee for. I'm just baffled that something so small and insignificant would end up on my report. I didn't even get charged a late fee! Isn't that normally the first course of action *before* it gets reported? Ah, anyway. . . is there anything else I can do?

[Anonymous]

One month late won't get reported. I was two months late 14 years a go on a 35 dollar balance which I forgot about. I kept disputumg it and they gave up denying it and removed it. In fact just dispute apl negative information and many companies will remove the negative item.

[Anonymous]

First it's not a law that they have to report you, but asking them to remove is futile.

The only possible solution is to contest it with the bureaus. Deny that you were late. Thus will trigger the credit bureaus to request proof from the credit card carrier. There is a small chance the credit card carrier will not respond timely and it will be removed. If they respond send evidence of similar payments and sect dumb like they are the contested one. If they fail yo timely respond bit will be removed. That is really your only hope at all.

Otherwise after 12 months it shouldn't affect anything.

[Anonymous]

Submit a complaint to the BBB. If it was a one time thing and so have a good credit history they will probably remove it. Check their online complaint resolutions to get an idea of what situations result in a resolution.

[Anonymous]

You arent getting it removed. Move on.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here, it's a relief to know they don't just look at the score but I'd still like to try to resolve this somehow. I'm going to write the credit agencies and let them know it was a glich in the autopay, the account is paid in full now, and my own bank doesn't even think this is significant enough to bother charging me a late fee for. I'm just baffled that something so small and insignificant would end up on my report. I didn't even get charged a late fee! Isn't that normally the first course of action *before* it gets reported? Ah, anyway. . . is there anything else I can do?

Again, the issue here is that they didn't really "report" it; credit cards automatically transfer huge amounts of transaction data to the credit bureaus. Your credit report shows your rolling balance for every month on every credit card. In this case, since there was a past due amount, it showed the past due amount. It is really not the same thing as being late on your Verizon bill, where someone at Verizon had to have made a conscious decision that a delinquency of X amount Y days late gets reported. This is also why it hopefully will not affect your score as much as the Verizon bill example.

I realize this explanation doesn't make it any less frustrating, and I'm sorry it happened to you. I'm just saying that from the credit card company's perspective, not reporting was not an option. They report all data, favorable or unfavorable, so from their perspective, the only options were "report accurate data" or "report false data."

I don't think you are going to get this removed from your report. Ultimately, if you write the credit agencies, they will end up giving you the option of providing a written narrative that will be included in your report when your report is pulled. I'm not sure the written narratives provide more benefit than just discussing the issue with your lender at the time you apply for credit, but it might make you feel better to get to take at least some action.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Submit a complaint to the BBB. If it was a one time thing and so have a good credit history they will probably remove it. Check their online complaint resolutions to get an idea of what situations result in a resolution.

I love complaining to the BBB and don't think people do this enough. But I'm not sure what the remedy is here. Your credit report shows your payment history for credit cards regardless of whether you paid on time or not. Would your suggested resolution be that the credit card company retroactively change the numbers for those months to show no balance when there was in fact a balance? I am skeptical the credit card company will do that.