Consumer complaint received 2020-07-23
Company: EQUIFAX, INC.
State: CA
Product: Credit reporting, credit repair services, or other personal consumer reports
Sub-product: Credit reporting
Issue: Problem with a credit reporting company's investigation into an existing problem
Sub-issue: Was not notified of investigation status or results

Complaint:
On XX/XX/XXXX, I began the process of applying for a home mortgage and my mortgage broker pulled my credit. On my account, they found an unpaid bill from XXXX from XX/XX/XXXX that was now in the hands of XXXX XXXX XXXX. In XXXX of XXXX ( final bill attached ), I closed my personal XXXX  account and joined a family plan, meaning that this bill, for just me, in XXXX did not make any sense as I was no longer a sole customer and the current plan I had was under another name in my group. I tried to submit a dispute via phone to Equifax three times. Each time I would spend 10 minutes waiting to get through to a person and the second I would get through, the call was dropped. This was extremely frustrating as I could not speak to a real person to ask questions. I submitted a dispute to Equifax for this unpaid bill, claiming that I had never seen this bill. I also submitted my final bill to XXXX in XXXX which I had paid in full. I also want to note that I had actually NEVER seen this bill. I had never received anything in the mail about it, never an email, no communication whatsoever. I never delete my emails for this exact reason. The address that XXXX XXXX XXXX had on file for me was my home 6+ years ago and I no longer live there, let along that city. 

On XX/XX/XXXX, my Equifax dispute had " closed. '' For 1 week, their website did not work and I could not actually read the file about my dispute. A week later, I was able to get onto their website and I was told that they found that the bill in fact was attached to my name and was not fraud. I was upset, and decided to call XXXX XXXX XXXX and pay it. Because it was {$33.00} dollars and I had the means to do so. This was on XX/XX/XXXX. 

My mortgage broker then advised me to call XXXX XXXX XXXX back and ask for them to delete it off of my credit score as this is something they sometimes do for people who are trying to buy a house. I called XXXX XXXX XXXX the next day ( XX/XX/XXXX ) and spoke to a " manager. '' After asking them to remove this from my credit she told me that there was nothing I could do because I had already paid it. She also disclosed to me that the file has still be in dispute status and I could have possibly had it removed if I had waited. Equifax told me it was closed. I had absolutely no idea that it was still under dispute when I had called to pay it. The customer representative did not disclose that information to me and just took my money. The manager told me that I would have had to " ask '' about it but why would I ask if I did not know that was even an option? Regardless, there was no help whatsoever to educate me on the process when I called to pay it and there was no information about the companies still in the dispute process. 

I then also on XX/XX/XXXX, called XXXX to see if they could help me at all. The customer service rep told me they could not do anything and that it was in XXXX XXXX XXXX hands at this point.

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation