Little Victories

Back in December, I discovered that three companies had been mis-reporting things on my credit-score – reporting finances/loans/debts that had been included in the bankruptcy as still being ‘in default’ (i.e. not paid) every month since. As a result, I wrote to all three, asking them to correct the information and sort things out.

One company- one at the allegedly ‘bad end’ of the finance industry – came back to me on the same day, agreeing that they’d got it wrong, and correcting things all the way back to 2012, the time of the bankruptcy. Happy day.

The other two – supposedly more ‘responsible’ and ‘professional’ organisations – have dawdled and faffed about with it. They’ve both failed to live up to their own complaints procedures and timescales, and generally just taken their time to get things sorted.

In the end it’s taken extra hassles, extra letters and calls, and mentions of going to the Financial Ombudsman, the Information Commissioner (for dodgy reporting of information) and the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA)  And that’s the ‘professional’ companies, don’t forget.

But it’s all sorted now – my latest credit report shows that they’re now all reporting the accounts as closed/satisfied (which’ll do) but it’s taken three months to get it done.

The fix to the scores isn’t immediate – but as these things go further back in time, they fade in importance on the scores, and that will start to improve properly now.  It’s been a pain in the arse to get sorted, but it’s done now, and that counts as a little victory, another improvement in the long path.  And it’ll do for now.