I had a loan with a company for about 4 years. The loan has completely destroyed my credit due to numerous amounts of deliquencies on my report (younger days). Anyway, I am in the process of purchasing my first home and am working with a Mortgage Broker. My Broker told me to pay the loan completely off to a zero balance, which I did. Right after my loan was paid completely off and the account was closed, I received an alert from Equifax as well as a hard copy of my report showing that this company had ran a hard inquiry, requesting to pull my credit which I did not authorize them to do. I am so upset now because #1, my credit score is already low due to many deliquencies on my report. I tried to get the company to completely remove the entire account IF I paid the entire balance to zero. This was when the account was still open. Balance was $1000. The company disagreed and I end up still paying the balance completely off.

To sum this up, Can they do this? Can they run my credit after the account is closed without my permission. I NEVER requested to have this done. Is this illegal? I was told from my broker to NOT apply for any new lines of credit, no new inquiries on credit report. What can I do? I want to NEGOTIATE with them to have them completely remove the entire account from my credit, which would bost my credit score even higher. Should I seek an attorney? I really need this account completely removed from my report. I read that this is illegal and a fine of $2500.

Just need guidance. Please reply ASAP.

Thanks for your help,

They have done nothing illegal. Your credit score was low long before they ran your latest check. Let's face the facts, you had developed a bad credit history due to "numerous amounts of deliquencies on my report (younger days). " That is a valid rationale for lowering your score. You were a bad risk for a mortgage. You will find a mortgage but will likely pay higher points and interest. Take that mortgage and make all of your payments on time for a few years and therefinance when your score is up. Try an ARM for now.

No one can drop that account off your credit report. It is a part of your credit history and even though it is paid off, people offering credit need to know your past history with paying installment accounts. Anyone that told you they can have it removed was mistaken. It will no longer be considered a part of your history after 8 years.

I don't understand why they ran your credit again. Was that balance negotiated down from a higher amount? I made the mistake once of paying off my mother's credit card that had gotten out of control. When it showed "paid and closed" on her credit report, other creditors started chiming in and wanted to get paid (they had written the accounts off as uncollectable.) All kind of inquiries on her credit were made.

ballengerb1 has the right idea. Take the higher interest loan for now. DON'T BE LATE on a single payment and in about 2 years you will be able to refinance at a much better rate.

To clarify, they can remove it from your credit report, but they don't have to. They can offer to do so as its basically the only bargaining chip they have to make you pay but Emland is right, it's part of your credit history so it should be there. I have only had 1 collection agent agree to remove something but they sent me something in writing before I paid agreeing to do it if I paid them immediately.

Unfortunately I don't think you can sue them for anything, they can always claim they ran that credit report before they received the payment or before it was applied to your account and it's hard to disprove unless it was months later.