Consumer complaint received 2024-01-22
Product: Credit reporting or other personal consumer reports — Credit reporting
Issue: Incorrect information on your report — Account status incorrect
Company: MARINER FINANCE, LLC (PA)

I took out a secured loan ( refinance of another Mariner loan ) with Mariner Finance in XX/XX/XXXX. Around XX/XX/XXXX, I ran into financial troubles and was not able to make my monthly payment on time for the next two months. After missing the two monthly payments, my account was sent to a law firm for collections. In XX/XX/XXXX, I received a collection notice from the attorneys office and I called Mariner to try to make an agreement to catch up on my payments directly with them as opposed to working through the law firm. At this time I also noticed on my credit report that the account was noted as a collection account and also with a closed status. The representative I spoke to at Mariner, said that once an account is sent to legal it is noted as collections and there is nothing she can do about it. Nevertheless, at that time ( XX/XX/XXXX ) I was able to set an agreement with her to make two months of payments on my account to catch up with the payment still being due for XXXX. To note those payments were made directly with the local Mariner representative, and not through a collection agency or other legal representative. At the end of XXXX I made two monthly payments to get my account completely back on track ( payments for both XXXX and XXXX ) At that time I asked the local Mariner office again if they would be willing to update my account status as the account is now back to an on time status, not closed or sitting with a collection agency. The representative at the local office again responded there is nothing she can do, and I must talk to corporate. I then submitted a dispute to XXXX, protesting the listing of the account as closed and collections, to no avail. In XX/XX/XXXX, I called the corporate headquarters to try to once again dispute the account status and the representative informed me that the account is actually not showing as closed on her side ( it is on my XXXX credit report! ) but confirmed once again that the account is listed as and will remain as a collection account until the account is fully paid off. I believe this is an incredibly unfair business practice to the consumer, particularly on a loan with a term that has multiple months ( in my instance, the term is more than 20 months! ) and thus will have a negative impact on my credit for more than two years while I am still actively making payments with the creditor and the account remains in an on time status despite it being listed as a collection account ( and closed nevertheless! ) understand there was a point when my account was past due, but I have since returned my account to a positive status and dont understand why a creditor would be allowed to continue to report a debtors account as a collection when that is not the case. It seems Mariner Finance has elected to put in place a policy that is incredibly unfair to the debtor which will cause undue long term financial harm to me given the impact of the collection status of the account on credit which other creditors will surely view as derogatory and thus prevent me from qualifying for other credit.