PRA group's recording of debt on credit file

spikeykatt

Hi all. 
Context: I became mentally unwell during Covid and was under psychiatric care. During this time, I stopped paying my Barclaycard (first time ever) and it snowballed as I wasn't able to deal with it. It was passed to the PRA group and once well, I made contact and set up an arrangement to pay. All has gone well and they treated me respectfully. I have tried to go for car finance and it flagged up my issues with Barclaycard. The debt is listed with PRA on the file and I am marked as defaulting every month despite the arrangement to pay and the fact I make the payment as and when I should. There is an option to mark as 'Arrangement to pay' but they won't use that- I have asked.  So it looks as though I am doing nothing to sort the debt despite the fact that I am. PRA have told me it's tough luck effectively, until the debt is cleared. Is this correct please? I understand how the non-payment will sit on my account, I just wish there was some way of letting potential creditors know I am treating the debt seriously and have taken it on to sort it. Thank you. 

sourcrates

Barclaycard have sold your debt to PRA group, its common for an account to be defaulted after at least 4/5 missed contractional repayments, in line with CONC guidance, once defaulted, it stays that way, and cannot be reversed.

Look on your credit file, the date of default will be shown, what you see each month is just a status update of that default, it will be automatically removed after 6 years, regardless of what you do.

If they had marked your file "AP" (arrangement to pay) that would have stayed on file for 6 years after you finish repaying the debt, so potentially quite a lot longer, so you are much better off with the default, than the AP marker.

fatbelly

If you get a proper report, e.g.

https://www.experian.co.uk/consumer/statutory-report.html

You will see that there is a default registered, and a date. It may also show default balance and present balance and payments made recently.

Yes, they could have marked it Arrangement to Pay but that still affects your credit and does so for longer as the entry does not drop off until 6 years after the debt is settled

As things stand you can see when the entry disappears because it will be 6 years after the default.

And other potential lenders can see what happened.

The other advantage with a proper report is that you can check other accounts are accurately reported, check financial links, whether you are on the electoral roll and any court action against you.

spikeykatt

Thank you @fatbelly and @sourcrates- I was aware of this information -non-reversal etc but not the length of time AP will stay on there. I was aware that AP still affects your credit but it was more the case I just wanted others to see that I simply haven't ignored the debt. I have reports from Experian, Credit Karma etc as well. 

sourcrates

Lenders can see your balance reducing over time from the information available to them from your full report.

Silly as it may sound, defaults are better as they will be gone in 6 years regardless, the old AP markers stay a lot longer.