"Settled" loan included in bankruptcy changed to "active" 5 1/2 years later

Rscott93 · 4 January 2023 at 7:22PM

Hello all.

I declared myself bankrupt on 28/02/2017 and was discharged on 28/02/2018.

One of the creditors of whom was included in the bankruptcy was a loan from Post Office Money (Bank of Ireland). I had a long drawn out battle with them after following the advice in Fermi's "post bankruptcy credit file clean up" thread on here. Essentially they were refusing to update the default date to reflect 28/02/2018 as per DPA requirements. I raised a formal complaint with them subsequently going to the ICO (Information Commisioners Office) and FOS (Financial Ombudsman Service). Following this I was awarded a fee in compensation and the credit was made to correct my file to reflect the debt as "SETTLED" and the default date correctly reflecting 28/02/2018.

I have just been checking my credit records as I am coming close to the 6-year post bankruptcy period and it appears that Post Office Money, a few months after the above, have changed the debt back to active. There is no record of a default and the account status simply shows the balance which was left to pay and does not have any suggestion that it is settled. This is on Experian.

What on earth am I supposed to do? I have worked tirelessly over the past 6 years to rebuild my credit history, save up a deposit for a mortgage and other things amongst this.

Do I go through the complaints route with Post Office Money again or do I go straight to the ICO / FOS, knowing full well that there is currently a significant backlog?

For what it's worth, I have kept copies of all the original correspondence including the letter from the FOS / ICO advising them of what they need to do.

Any advice here would be greatly appreciated.