How Long Do Past Due Accounts Stay on Your Credit Report?

Past-due accounts on a credit report may hamper a consumer's credit rating for years. People remain in a cycle of poor credit ratings with each delinquent payment. That's because each year a late payment goes into a consumer's credit file, it takes several more years to remove it.

Delinquent Accounts

Information about past-due accounts generally remains in a consumer's credit file for seven years. However, not all late payments appear in credit reports. Many creditors and lenders don't report late payments to credit bureaus unless consumers miss a billing cycle, which makes a payment about 30 days late. In such cases, consumers usually see a notation on their credit reports that indicate they made a payment to an account 30 days late. Notations on credit reports also reveal whether a delinquent account is in collections.

Inaccuracies

You should be leery of companies that claim they can clean up negative information in consumers' credit files. No one can legally remove information about past-due accounts from a credit report when the information is accurate, according to the U.S. Federal Trade Commission. Consumers can dispute inaccurate information they find in a credit report with the credit bureau that's reporting it. Gather evidence to prove your claim in a dispute. For example, send the credit bureau a copy of a canceled check to show you made a payment on time if a creditor has inaccurately reported that you made a late payment.

Debt Collectors

Debt collection companies may still try to collect an unpaid debt even if it's more than seven years old and no longer appears on your credit report. Nonetheless, the Experian credit reporting company notes on its website that collectors usually back off trying to collect debts that are more than seven years old. That's partly because the older a debt is, the harder it is to collect when it no longer appears on a person's credit report.

Delinquency Dates

You can determine whether information about a past-due account should be removed from your credit report by looking at the original delinquency date on the report. That's the date when a creditor or lender first reported a late payment on the account. People who find outdated delinquencies on their credit report can submit the information to the credit bureau reporting the delinquencies to get them removed.