I have always made sure I had a perfect credit score. Yesterday I go on my free credit report site and I see my score droped almost 200 points. I searched all my history and found a judgement for $419.00 dollors. I called the collection co. and it turns out it's for my adult son (27) and has nothing to do with me. They said they would put in a birthday so I can prove it's not my debt but now I have to fight it out with the credit score companies. I really dont have time and dont want to pay for an attorney. Do I have any legal recourse I can take? Can I sue them for lelal cost? Any info would help.
Thanks Mike

Good Luck with dealing with these agencys. They are immune to reality.

:pout:This is not intended to be legal advise.

Is this a problem based on Sr. Jr? If it is, get used to it. My father had a constant battle over the Senior, Junior. A lot of people do not realize that Sr. or Jr. is a legal part of their name and needs to be present on EVERYTHING that has your name on it.
Unfortunately, Senior does not usually become SENIOR until the birth of JUNIOR. Some twenty or thirty years can pass and then You already have a mountain of paperwork, mostly absent of the Sr.
OK Junior... Dads, No one wants to be Junior. Junior will not normally have Jr, at the end of his name until forced to do so. Lets say at age 20 Junior decides to start using Jr. So, for forty to fifty years we have two people with the same name. and usually the same address. Some of these years will overlap with no one really raising much of a fuss over this until something bad happens. Death, civil suite, criminal proceedings, divorce and etc. all will complicate the lives of family members sharing names and addresses, albeit sometimes for a short duration.

A persons age is rarely associated with the name. Adding to the problem is today's identity theft issues, where we disassociate our birth date, social security number, drivers license number from our name. When the legal hammer is dropped, all of a sudden you have people scrambling to catch up on their legal paperwork and try to prove who they are and mostly who they are not.

If this scenario fits your bitch, then YOU probably created most of the problem .
But it could always be worse (of course) How would you like to be George Foreman with four or five sons named George?
To all of you macho guys out there dreaming of the little man who will carry not only the family name but YOUR mane, think long and hard and do your homework. After the fact is like playing a legal game of pick up sticks.

this isnt legal advice either, but years ago i had a hit on a credit report, but it was settled to everyones satisfaction, but was still on the report-the credit reporting co. said that they only report what they are given-i told them they have one day to ck it out, remove it or i will sue, based on the fact that i was never contacted to verify how accurate the info. was
guess what, next day it was removed (they were affraid a whole new movement would be started against them in how they do business)
i was willing to stand in front of the business with a sign till hell froze over if i had to
something i never understood, though, if someone does a credit ck on you, your score takes a hit???????????????????

Who do you go to if the credit bureau won't budge? You would think that there needs to be a watchdog of some sort. These people act like they have unlimited power. Everybody should have to answer to a higher authority or some regulating commission or ?? what.
:noway:
I had a utility company try to screw me and I contacted the Utility Regulation Commission ( I think thats what the were called) in Pennsylvania and they took care of it in a hurry. I had pretty good documentation.

I believe the office of the Attorney General for your state is the watchdog for consumer problems like credit reporting. Check it out and see what you can find.

Write a letter to the credit reporting agencies, explaining this is an error. They have to look in to it. If they determine it is, which they should if your sotry above is correct, they can expunge it from your record w/o the collection agencies permission. I've done the above several times. However, that won't prevent the collection agency from running it through again. They often do this. So you must write them to let them know they are reporting on the wrong persons credit. Be sure you send the letter to the collection agency as certified mail for documentation. If they don't resolve it, then I would look into having an attourney write them a letter. My wife has a side business she's where you have prepaid legal assistance for these type of cases.

This was a few years back, but somebody got ahold of my Moms info and opened a credit card account. They went to The Disney Store and racked up 500 bucks or so. Police called her and she said no it wasnt her, filed a report against that lady, and so forth. Long story short, it still took about a year for that to get off her credit. She had perfect credit, then that screwed it up. It's back to normal now, but still took a solid year to get fixed.

Just had something on the local news about that

Contact each of the 3 agencies and request a dispute form. Fill out out and return it and they have 30 days to respond. Durring that period, they're supposed to take it off your report.

After 30 days, they can either take it off or leave it on but if thjey leave it on, you can make them put a disclaimer on the item that youv'e disputed it.

After 30 days, they can either take it off or leave it on but if thjey leave it on, you can make them put a disclaimer on the item that youv'e disputed it.A step further: When you dispute, demand that they either provide evidence that the debt is in fact yours, or it must be removed. If the bureau cannot confirm, they MUST remove it by law. I went through this, and demanded that they send me names, phone numbers, and times of the people that the credit reporting agency spoke to at the debt company. They couldn't be bothered, and removed it from my report.
And make sure the creditor clears this up with your son...

Some things never change. My father shared the same name as my grandfather. Everything was ok until my Dad returned from WWII as an adult and started getting confused with Grandpa. The solution was that my grandfather changed is legal name to Orrie Gilroye (OrrieG) my Dad kept his name (Ormond Jack).

Just had something on the local news about that

Contact each of the 3 agencies and request a dispute form. Fill out out and return it and they have 30 days to respond. Durring that period, they're supposed to take it off your report.

After 30 days, they can either take it off or leave it on but if thjey leave it on, you can make them put a disclaimer on the item that youv'e disputed it.

I contacted free credit report.com and have to pay $12.00 a month for a membership and they are going to help me out by doing the same thing. I dont mind the $12.00 if they can keep my credit score clean.
thanks Mike

As far as clearing up items on a credit report it can be done if you are persistant.

I protect myself from identity theft with "C.C" that stands for Chitty Credit. If someone steals my identity they will probably be more in debt than before they stole it.