A couple of months ago, I made this post and was stunned by the response, support, and similar stories I received.
This whole fiasco has finally come to a close and I figured I would give you a quick update.
I received tons of comments and private messages encouraging me to contact my local congressman to have them act on my behalf. After getting nowhere with DFAS or the Department of Treasury, that was the route I took. My congressman's office was seemingly happy to investigate on my behalf and did so very efficiently.
While I was waiting for a reply from my congressman's office, the Dept of Treasury wound up offsetting my tax return. There was a lot of confusion as the amount they offset my return for was different than the original amount of the debt, and different from the amount that the initial letter I received said I owed.
As was originally thought by many, this was in-fact a travel pay debt. I can't say with any certainty what I did with my travel voucher after leaving the Army, but as far as DFAS is concerned I did not return it and that pretty much is that.
My congressman's office wound up getting some responses and their letters actually cleared up the situation and made sense of the timeline. Although, they even said outright they couldn't explain why it took so long to discover the debt, or why I wast contacted prior to the letter from the Dept of Treasury.
About a month ago, the collections account was removed from my accounts at the 3 credit bureaus and my score has fully recovered a full 100 points as of today (at least at the 2 i can see at the moment). I have no doubt that had I not taken the advice of many of you here, this would have caused years of damage.
So in the end, my tax return was offset and I wound up paying the money back, but I did get some explanation and my credit has been repaired, which was more than I had honestly expected.
Thanks again!
Submitted April 19, 2018 at 07:41PM by ExcelsAtMediocrity https://ift.tt/2HD7xCG
