How to Determine an Original Delinquency Date

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Dear Experian,

How do you find out the original delinquency date of an account?

- KYN

Dear KYN,

The original delinquency date is the date the account first became delinquent and was not brought current, or the first late payment in a series. This date is used to determine when the late payment information will be deleted from your credit report.

How Long Do Late Payments Remain?

Late payments, also called delinquencies, remain on your credit report for seven years. That means if you make a payment 30 days or more past the due date and it is reported to the credit bureaus, the late payment will fall off your report seven years from when it was reported late (even if you bring the account current the next month).

If you missed three payments in a row, your account would be reported 90 days late. The seven-year period would begin with the first payment you missed in that series. All three payments would be deleted seven years from that date. The date of the first missed payment in the 90-day series is called the "original delinquency date," or sometimes the "date of first delinquency."

How to Calculate When an Account Will Be Removed From Your Report

If an account was reported as past due today, the payments were never brought current, it was charged off as bad debt, and it was closed and sent to collection, then the original delinquency date would be today's date. The entire account would be automatically deleted from your credit history seven years from today's date.

If the charged-off debt was eventually paid off, it would be updated to reflect a paid charge-off, but the history of the account would still remain for seven years from that same date. If the subsequent collection account appeared on the report, it would also be deleted based on that same original delinquency date.

Whether the entire account will be deleted seven years later is determined by whether you brought the account current after the missed payment. If the account was brought current before it was charged off, the late payments that have reached seven years old will be removed, but the rest of the account history will remain.

Thanks for asking.

Jennifer White, Consumer Education Specialist