Consumer complaint received 2020-01-23
Company: AMERICAN EXPRESS COMPANY
State: MI
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: Problem with personal statement of dispute

Complaint:
Problem : I requested an equity loan from my mortgage company since I was in a great equity situation and my appraisal was excellent to pay off my credit card debt. This process start mid XX/XX/XXXX with XXXX XXXX. On XX/XX/XXXX XXXX, the underwriter sent " Great news! Your mortgage loan with XXXX has been approved. '' The papers stated this was a refinance loan. When I questioned, I was told that in order to pay off the 2 credit cards that I was trying to eliminate from my debt, I needed to do a refi and a 2nd mortgage. I was emphatic that I did not want a 2nd mortgage, but if a refi is the only way, I want the property taxes put back in my payment. And I would like to look at the numbers so I can decide for myself if I wanted to do the refi or the equity loan. I was told that they could do that but it would take another week or two to restructure the deal. I asked at that time, would this take longer than 30 days? If so I would go ahead & make my monthly payment. XXXX XXXX told me not to pay my credit cards because this would definitely be handled within 2 weeks. Well that didn't happen. Over the course of the next four months, I continued to ask what the hold up was on " restructuring '' my deal. I continuously made arrangements with my credit card companies to make payment arrangements. XXXX  XXXX continuously gave me fictitious dates that never came to fruition and I continuously gave these dates to the credit card companies. Who by the way were very good in working with me because I have been a long time customer since XXXX. I was told at one time that XXXX XXXX, who is not the underwriter, is on vacation and I would have to wait for him to return. Then when XXXX   returned, they wanted something showing that I had not changed jobs. My product services company changed hands, but I have been doing XXXX XXXX for XXXX XXXX XXXX for over 7 yrs and full time with XXXX XXXX 20 yrs previous to that. Over the next few months, I kept getting excuse after excuse. Around XX/XX/XXXX, XXXX XXXX informed me that they would not be able to pay off my credit cards and put my taxes back into my payment. On XX/XX/XXXX XXXX, the underwriter again sent " Great news! Your mortgage loan with XXXX has been approved. '' On XX/XX/XXXX, XXXX XXXX sends this note, " No worries underwriting is working out a minor IT issue so they can clear your loan in the system so nothing for you to worry about. '' Finally XX/XX/XXXX, I contacted a supervisor XXXX XXXX requesting a closure. His response was " I do apologize for the inconvenience. We had a unique situation with your income being that you moved from one temp agency to your current temp agency that you are employed by. It creates slightly different underwriting requirements, that took time for us to structure a deal that would work for you, where we could maximize to get you the best deal possible, saving you as much money as possible. Were hoping to get your loan flipped back to underwriting for final review and final clear to close, and should hopefully be able to get this refinance closed shortly afterwards. Ideally, were targeting to get this done within the next week for you. '' XX/XX/XXXX, XXXX  XXXX sends leaves me a voice mail stating we will not be able to do your loan because your credit score has gone down. I contacted XXXX XXXX and his email back to me says, " your did not make your XXXX payment '', which is not true. It was late but made that month. So in conclusion, my credit card has cancelled me, my property taxes are past due and my credit score has now tanked. I am also discussing this matter with an attorney who suggested I contact your agency also. 
I informed the credit company that I would be paying the card or cards off through the refinancing of my home mortgage which would include using the equity in my home to completely pay off the outstanding balance. The credit card company was in full agreement. To make this happen I would be making regular payments it would be a payment in-full after the refinance. So, I didnt make payments in compliance with our discussions. Until this action I had made my payments on-time. I filed case # XXXX on XX/XX/XXXX with CFPB, that detailed how I was being taken advantage by the potential lender. After this transaction failed, I worked out a monthly installment payment agreement with the credit card company. I am complaining that the credit card company knew that holding these payments out would adversely affect my credit history and never informed be of that. The effect was dropping my credit score from XXXX to XXXX. Now because of this I am unable to refinance my home because these delinquencies are being reported. I believe it clearly unfair that I am adversely affect by these transactions although I am working with the company.

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation