but I assume ( hope) that if you never pay it off it is never removed from your credit file Nope! It disappears into the ether after 6 years. There are many reasons why it should, some good, some more dubious.
Take my case: 1984 I get a storecard to start getting a credit rating. I pay it off. This is before the era of internet banking and, apparently, there was a little lag betweeen by getting my closig balance, paying it and a tiny bit of interet being owed, literally a penny or two. The normal procedure was to write it off, like ullage in a pub!
However, the financial crash of the 80s/90s put paid to that as banks sold off their debts. I had been paying off another debt to the same lender and, when that finished I cancelled the DD. That sparked a somewhat delayed shit storm of ridiculous proportions.
Four years after my last payment to that lender the notorious company Link sent me a letter saying someone had tried to open an account in my name, could I confirm the details? So, being naive, I rang them and they prceeded to threaten me for £560 debt that had grown out of my paying off and closing down a store card.
They claimed that my payments to the same lender were against the debt they had bought. Well, the storecard never had a debt - just that 'ullage' - the DD payment was a scheduled loan payment for a large purchase, all paperwork was made available and they did what they are infamous for, lied and insisted they were right. They got increasingly threatening.
We signed up with an online forum to get help:
- That letter had been deemed illegal a couple of years prior and they had been told stop sending them out.
- Every signature I had to write had a big X through it... they had been known to 'recycle' them
- We sent off the £10 for all info, stating it was in payent for the paperwork, not against the debt whoch I refuted.... they sent 1 piece of paper and took the £10 off the debt - which of course then gave them day 1 of a further 6 years.
- Sent them a letter with the legal info stating that they had acted illegally - got a letter back saying it had been an error... but they had changed the data on my credit report and had to be forced to correct it.
- They had no proof of the debt, so, as per the recommendations, I wrote to the original debtor.. via Santander who had bought out the last in a long line of companies that had owned the original storecard company... they had no data, confirmed they were not chasing me for any debt.
- Forwarding that to Link, as per the law, and that too was deemed new contact and, agan, gave them a new day 1 of a further 6 years... again Noddle, Experian etc found against them and amended my credit rating.
- A new comany sent me a letter, offering to help me sort out the issues with Link... a quick Google showed that they were the same directors, Head Office address, I ignored it... and the next 2 new, helpful companies who offered to step in for me!
- Last year, a year after moving house, I got another 'Hi, we're Link and you need to start repaying this debt" That was 30 years after I closed the storecard, 10 years after the last time they asserted I had paid anything to the lender and 4 years after they had last contacted me.
I am still ignoring the sporadic letters they send.
I now check my credit rating just to make sure they haven't added anything. I am not the only person they have done this to... RBS (my original lender who sold off the storecard I had my account with) still funds them (or did 5 years ago). Yes that RBS the one we, the UK, bailed out and are majority share holders in!
If debts like that stayed we'd none of us have clean credit ratings!
Sorry, that was long. convoluted and off topic.. but it still really annoys me!