Below is my situation. I am wondering what would be the next best step.
Back in 2011-2013 I used comcast. Previously i had comcast in Chicago. I moved my service with me when i moved to Minneapolis. Huge mistake, they are so disorganized that a ton of issues came up on their end with double billing, mistaken address, and what not. My old company would pay for my internet, and Comcast got me in a lot of trouble with my expense reports. Luckily i moved to an area in Minneapolis with fiber internet and ditched comcast. Once you end a contract you have to return the equipment
I returned the equipment in a drop off location in minneapolis. A month later i get a call saying that i didn't return the equipment. I told them that i did in the Minneapolis drop off, they told me some odd story that it needed to be dropped off in Chicago. Then called me back saying Minneapolis was fine but i hadn't returned it. Problem is I did. They called roughly 7-10 times asking about the equipment, each time i told them that i already returned it and i don't know what else to do. They would say that it could be processing in the center and it will show up in the account.
Unbeknownst to me is that they placed a collection on my account. They may have sent a bill for the collection in the mail, my guess is that it went to the chicago address. They may have emailed me, but at the time my internet was being paid by my company so it was connected to my company email. I left that company so if they emailed me anything i wouldn't have been able to access it. This is partly my fault, the calls stopped so i stopped caring about it. I do remember getting calls from a collection agency, but i thought they were scam calls so i would never answer. I was young back then and didn't really care.
Fast forward to earlier this year, i want to buy a house now. I've always checked my FICO scores from my credit card home page and those scores have been 750-800 range for the past two years. Went to get a mortgage thinking my credit score was great and found out that they weren't, i had an average of 670 from the 3. I get a hold of my credit report and see the only negative thing is this collections from comcast for a total of $133.
I first call the collection agency and ask for a pay for delete, they immediately said they didn't do that. I didn't push or negotiate after they said no. I then asked them to validate the debt. In the meantime I disputed this record in all 3 agencies.
Within 2 days of the dispute experian deleted the collection account off my record and my experian score rose to 780. I was stoked. However i found out today that Equifax and Transunion have both validated the collection and it stays on. Also the collection agency Waypoint Resources sent me a letter validating the debt. I have no proof myself that the charges are bogus since I don't have the receipt they gave me that I returned my equipment. It's my word vs theirs.
This whole thing is so fucking stupid, i can't believe i'm still getting screwed with comcast. What should I do next? Is there a way that i could contact comcast directly and work something out with them? Also i mean i don't care about the $133, i'd gladly spend $500 to delete it off my records. Would hiring a lawyer work?
Currently my credit ratings are 680, 670, and 780 as off today.
Edit: i'm not worried about the actual amount. I would gladly pay $500-1000 to remove the debt. I'll have to double check, but the increase in my mortgage rate due to my poor scores is roughly $250-300/mo. That's the part that annoys me. Also i'm in no rush to close
Submitted March 13, 2019 at 09:39PM by mrpyrotec89 https://ift.tt/2CjvFpY
