My response from a goodwill letter

[forgop]

Any idea how I should try to scam my way around this one?

Dear Mr. XXXXXX,

Upon review of your account, it appears that the credit reporting is correct. My records indicate that the payment due on January 1, 2004 was not received until February 11, 2004. This resulted in us reporting a 30-day delinquency to the credit bureaus.

While I would like to assist you in this matter, we are obligated to report accurately to the credit reporting agencies. However, if you can provide documentation showing this payment was made on time, I will be happy to make the correction.

If I can be of further assistance, please feel free to call me at 1.800.xxx.xxxx.

Sincerely,

XXXXX XXXXXXXX XXXXXXX

XXXXXX XXXXXXXX

[Anisah_H]

Bump

[retmar]

Do you have your cancelled check with dates showing different than they claim? Check your statements and bank also if you don't have the check. This is the only way you can get around it unless you live in California. Then, it would depend on whether they notified you properly.

Or, as some have done in the past, write a letter to the CEO and tell them that upon receipt of their letter, you conducted your own investigation and found, unfortunately, that they were correct and you apologize for the inconvience. Therefore, you are now asking if they would reconsider deleting the mark as you are approaching lenders to purchase a home and you would like to receive the best interest rate possible. Since you have now learned your lesson, blah, blah, you will never do this again blah, blah. You can also add that you checked and found that the information in their letter was not totaly correct, in regards to reporting, as the law only says that IF they report, it must be true.

[Sultan]

Other people have tried writing a letter clearly stating that you did make the payment on time. And it was either not accepted, problems with mail delivery, (such as it was returned with incomplete information) etc.

I would seriously put it back on them and tell them as nicely yet firmly as you can that you are required as a matter of personal policy not to accept late payments on your credit report that you know you paid on time.

I might also tell them that you were unsure as to the amount or something along the lines of a run around like we consumers get when we try to deal with issues which are usually not in our favor and could have transpired from some lame not being on top of things or incompetent.

Best free advise I can suggest is if you do and are able to get it removed, make sure you pay early on EVERYTHING! from here on forward. But again as to suggestions make your reasons as difficult for them to pin down as it would be for us to pin a gorilla collection agency down, just play the game back on them in a nice professional fashion especially if they are one of your trade account holders.

I also recommend sending a letter certified return receipt to let them know that your serious and you truly feel you paid the bill on time and were very suprised to see the late payment.

I had the same problem with BOA one time on my credit card account and they said they would remove the late, and as anyone could only guess when i pulled the credit report it showed a late, I called the bank and told them very sadly sounding that it made me feel like closing all of my accounts with them and not doing business with them any more. They removed the late payment, I had to memorialize to a manager referencing my own notes that i was promised the late would be changed and it never happened and what serious problem of the right hand not communicating with the left hand that was for their financial institution.