Need Free Advice on Credit Score Repair (Houston: chapel, credit report)

[Texascrude]

Long story short -- we cancelled our AT&T land-line about a year ago when we moved from Chapel Hill to Houston. We cancelled it over the phone, made amends, and moved away. Nothing out of the ordinary.

Fast forward 15 months. We run a free credit report (we last had our credit scores run when we bought a house 1 year ago) and see that my wife's credit score has gone from 810 down to 650. Apparently, we had an outstanding bill of about $20 for a week or two between billing cycles when we moved. We have NEVER received a bill for this, NEVER been called, nothing. In fact, we currently have our cell phone plans with AT&T (8 months into our contract), they have our credit card on file, and we have NEVER heard anything about this charge.

We're trying to figure out what to do, and I was wondering if anyone has had a similar experience? We'd have gladly paid our bill, we just didn't know anything was due, since we were never contacted. Furthermore, I find it odd that we're currently their customers and they've never said anything about an outstanding balance. Seems like they should be required to make a reasonable effort to collect before they destroy your credit like that. Needless to say, my wife is pretty upset about this. In the meantime, we can just use my score for anything we need, but it seems silly that a $20 charge has essentially outweighed the tens of thousands of dollars she's repaid on time (paying off our monthly credit card balances, mortgage, etc).

They haven't been tremendously helpful so far and we're still trying to get to a high enough manager that can actually make a decision, but I'd like to have some options laid out before we get to that point.

[TexasResident]

Pay for delete letter. Worked for me. Google has many sample letters.

[chris_ut]

I know you can challenge items on your report but have never had to do it. You should contact the credit agency to find out their procedure. 810 to 650 is a pretty steep drop for a $20 unpaid bill.

[Seoid]

I dealt with a similar situation about 5 years ago.

I called the company (in your case, AT&T) and explained the situation (no bill, no contact despite having all of my correct information) and offered to pay for the bill because, like you, it was a ridiculously low amount.

Bill had been sent to a collection agency (again, I'm SO upset because I pay my bills off on time, every time) so I ask if it can be bought back so I can deal directly with them because there was no fault of my own. Transferred to a supervisor and a few days later, we're good to go.

I pay bill in full, they work their magic and a month later it's off my credit report.

WHY they don't just contact you when they have all of your contact information is a mystery. I just think it's easier to sell your account to a collection agency. Funny thing is, Collection agency had my data for 3 months and NEVER attempted contact.

[wheretogo]

I did go though this drama. The problem is, any business can report anything against you to the CBs and it will show up on your credit report doing its own damage to your profile. CBs do not bother to validate the accuracy of what is being reported. The business is not required to prove anything UNTIL its being challenged by the consumer. Its entirely up to the customer to prove that (s)he is innocent when someone report crap against him/her. That's ridiculous.

In your case, CBs should have asked for proof and validated that the business made reasonable effort to get the money from you (which they claim you owe to them) before allowing it on your credit report. They just dont do that, because CB make their huge profit by servicing businesses and its in their best interest to keep the business happy and allow them to do whatever they want to do.

How to fix it : You see a lot of information on creditboards.com forums.. search for 1-2-3 punch