Default on credit report. NEED HELP!

[adavis83]

Will try and keep this as short as possible.

It all started off with renewing my contract with Vodafone after being a loyal customer since the days of the Nokia 3210! I managed to go way over my data after my 6 month FREE Spotify trial finsihed and somehow ended up getting a £500 bill from Vodafone with no calls or messages regarding my extremely high and out the ordinary bill which was £29.99 I believe.

After trying to sort out and maybe come to some deal I was told that I could not get any help and would have to pay the full amount which in the end I gave up. After many phone calls and sleepless nights I decided to  cancel my contract as I was not happy with how I was being treated and was not happy with Vodafone anymore after being such a loyal customer.

After cancelling my contract I had to buy it out which cost me another £500+ at the time so my total bill came to £1,025.22 on the 22 July 2015 and was to pay £503.49 straightaway and the rest by 3rd August 2015. 

I managed to sort out a payment plan as at the time I was going through a bad time so I paid £170/£180 per month. Once this was all set up I never missed a payment and proceeded to make monthly payments. I have never been late with other payments and always on top of my finances. 

So, after getting my balance down to £170 without missing a payment I phoned Vodafone to make the last payment (hooray) and was delighted and pleased to have it all put behind me. I made what I thought was my last payment and I made sure by asking Customer service about 3 times to make  sure as I did not want any more hassle and I was told that this was the very last payment and I would have to do anything else and contract had been totally finished!! Happy days..........Everything was fine.......Until

7 months later I received a letter from a debt collection agency called Lowell financial LTD. 7 months prior to this I received no letters from either Vodafone or Lowell

I spoke to a lovely lady on Vodafone chat who finally got to the bottom of it all and it turns out that I still owed Vodafone £170.80 and as you can imagine I was very upset to hear this and I had no idea my debt was passed on - the debt I didn't know I had!!  

After much stress and agitation over the next few days I phoned up Vodafone and after telling this story to about 3 people as I was passed from person to person as they did not want to deal with me and I spoke to a lovely gentlemen who was more than happy to help and was very understanding and genuinely did fell sorry for me. After telling him what happened and setting up a payment plan to pay the rest of my bill off he told me that IT WAS Vodafone's fault and that there was nothing that they could do to wipe my credit report clean and that it would be on there for 6 years!!! I also told him about the debt being passed on and he said that my debt was still with Vodafone!!!!! And that someone made a mistake by passing the debt on and then cancelling it.

I am very upset that I am now paying the price for someone else's mistake.and passing my debt on without informing me. I would have been more than happy to pay the final £170 at the time but I had no idea I owed this money and was told my account was closed and payed off.

All I want is for my default to be removed from my account after Vodafone admitted it was their mistake.

I really hope someone can point me in the right direction and get this issue resolved. I was told that once I've paid it off which I intend to next week that it will show up on my credit report that I have paid it but the default will still be on there for the next 6 years!

[BandOfBrothers]

Hi,

This is a help guide I have written which explains which department to ask your case to be referred to - i.e 'Vodafone Credit File Support Team' - and how to add a 'Notice of Correction' via Experian. It is Free to add the Notice of Correction. This gives you the tools to add notes on your Credit File to explain why the Default is showing.

It would only be worth adding this if a person thinks the default is wrong and shouldn't have been applied. Please take into consideration that a Default will only be removed if it was reported on your Credit File incorrectly.

Link > Default-on-your-Credit-File-and How-to-add-a-Notice-of-Correction.

[Retired-LouiseE]

Hi @adavis83

I completely understand your worry and distress at this situation. I am going to send you a Private Message with further help on this. 

Louise