AMEX Missed Payment – Credit Report Flag

JRG123

Hello,

I'm currently remortgaging (due October) and have a flag on my account for 1 missed payment which i'm worried will impact my borrowing ability.

Complete mistake, accidentally missed a payment by 6 days as I was going through a busy period with a new job role. Otherwise have never missed a payment, always pay in full each month. Have since set up direct debit.

Amex have reported this to credit agencies and i have a flag on credit report. Have tried to dispute but had dispute rejected.

Gone to credit agencies to see if they can help, no luck… Equifax added a 'notice of correction' to my account:
"Notice of dispute - the individual concerned has disputed the accuracy of the information registered at this address and we have now contacted the subscriber concerned. Care should therefore be taken when using the data at this address to access the creditworthiness of the individual concerned."

My credit score with Equfax also dropped 76 points over night despite the late payment being 2 months ago.

My question is, should Amex have reported the late payment? Do I have any grounds to dispute/get removed? I've heard that credit agency guidelines say that lenders should only report if 30 days late? my payment was 6 days late. Unsure if this is true or not.

Thanks in advance for your help!

eskbanker

JRG123 said:

My question is, should Amex have reported the late payment? Do I have any grounds to dispute/get removed? I've heard that credit agency guidelines say that lenders should only report if 30 days late? my payment was 6 days late. Unsure if this is true or not.

I believe it may be true in the USA (where credit management is very different) but not here - have you found any authoritative source to support this?  Ultimately if you paid late then it's accurate for a lender to report this to credit agencies, otherwise everyone could extend payment terms unilaterally without consequences, so it's not obvious that there's any mechanism to challenge something factual and true?

Hoenir

If information held by the credit agencies is no correct. Then it be worthless to those purchasing the data. One late payment marker isn't going to make any difference to your application.  Common sense does prevail and allows for the occassional slip. 

DullGreyGuy

JRG123 said:

Hello,

I'm currently remortgaging (due October) and have a flag on my account for 1 missed payment which i'm worried will impact my borrowing ability.

Complete mistake, accidentally missed a payment by 6 days as I was going through a busy period with a new job role. Otherwise have never missed a payment, always pay in full each month. Have since set up direct debit.

Amex have reported this to credit agencies and i have a flag on credit report. Have tried to dispute but had dispute rejected.

Gone to credit agencies to see if they can help, no luck… Equifax added a 'notice of correction' to my account:
"Notice of dispute - the individual concerned has disputed the accuracy of the information registered at this address and we have now contacted the subscriber concerned. Care should therefore be taken when using the data at this address to access the creditworthiness of the individual concerned."

My credit score with Equfax also dropped 76 points over night despite the late payment being 2 months ago.

My question is, should Amex have reported the late payment? Do I have any grounds to dispute/get removed? I've heard that credit agency guidelines say that lenders should only report if 30 days late? my payment was 6 days late. Unsure if this is true or not.

Thanks in advance for your help!

Late and Missed payments are not the same thing. 

Your timelines seem wrong... if you paid it 6 days after the due date then that would be a late payment not a missed payment, if you paid it after the next statement was produced then that is a missed payment. AmEx's due date in my experience is always much earlier than within 6 days of the next statement. 

I have a chargecard with them, they've never reported a late payment but do report missed payments if the payment is received post the next statement. I would assume their credit cards are the same but it's an assumption. 

If you were late then you were late and the record is factually accurate so cannot be challenged on a technical route but you may ask for a gesture of goodwill from AmEx but have no rights to goodwill

When was this missed payment? Are you planning to remortgage with the same lender or move? I had no issues renewing my mortgage with the same lender with some missed AmEx payments on record for the same year despite the high LTV we have. I likewise have set up a DD since and they collect it only a week after the statement, the due date is a week later and the next statement is 2 weeks further later so a "6 day missed payment" would mean its 20 days+ from the due date

JRG123

Thanks all. 

Maybe it won't have as big of an impact as I'm imagining with remortgaging, I'm using a broker so will go with best deal available to me.

I did not know there was a difference between 'missed' and 'late' payment. 

It's noted as a late payment on my file (attached).