Back in 2001 Citibank reported both my husband's and my accounts to the credit reporting agencies. My first name is a common Christian one, while my husband's name is not, but is different. Our last name is obviously not an English name, but an Asian name. The person who reported my account to the credit bureaus had no intention of re-aging the debt. However, when they came across my husband's account and noticed his first and last names were not common American names, they deliberately re-aged the debt, when they should not have reported the default in the first place. The seven-year period was already gone at the time the report came out.
In December Citibank sent the files of my husband's accounts through an attorney network. The attorney receiving the files did nothing until March. My husband asked for all verification of the debts and disputed that he owed the money. By October suit was filed in court, and by December 5th my husband received a default notice. He was never served. According to records, the sheriff went to our place when nobody was home, but never followed up with service by certified first-class mail. The default was removed.
My husband entered a cross claim against Citibank for a laundry list of federal FDIC violations, including charging interest, over-the-limit fees and late fees. According to the law of the state where they were incorporated, Citibank should have written off the accounts at six months of default and not charged any interest or fees, as these are only to be charged on a credit card as "incident to the extension of credit."
Since my husband could no longer use his credit card, as his privileges were cut off, Citibank could no longer legally charge interest and all those fees. Furthermore, it meant "charge off," and any money paid toward the principal would have to be used only for the principal.
Citibank did not apply all the payments toward bringing down the principal when they should have. This went on for another 3 years until 1999. Since 1999 was the last payment, Citibank re-aged the debt by reporting to the credit bureaus that the accounts were scheduled to remain on record until 2006.
Federal law prohibits extending the reporting time past seven years because a debtor has made a post-charge-off payment. Because the report of the default was still on record by the time the lawyer got hold of it, they were able to get a judgment. Now we are fighting the battle again, at our own cost, on appeal, and it's pretty steep. Just to appeal costs 180 to file and 540 for trial transcripts. All of this for a trial that should never have taken place, because technically my husband's file was supposed to have been wiped clean before the credit report came out in 2001.
Because of this, Citibank was able to sue my husband based on a last payment 3 years past the six-year statute of limitations for suing. However, their lawyer never brought any renewed agreement promising to pay, so this is one thing we can argue to reverse the judgment.
In court the witness claimed Citibank computers could only go back 7 years. However, they produced an extra 10 months of records at the bottom which, according to testimony at the time of trial, should not have been there. So their witness perjured himself. The witness was also new to Citibank and did not have any personal knowledge of the actual default time.
Citibank brought self-serving evidence that did not match the dates of default in 1994. They brought in a 1994 agreement, but at that time my husband had no credit card, as they had taken away his right to use the card. They brought no signed agreement from the 1980s. They only brought statements from February 1996 to the date of trial, which was October. As I said, that is 10 months more than the testimony about what the computers could pull from the files.
During the trial the judge noticed no charges made on the credit card by my husband. Citibank's witness did not have an answer for that. All the charges in the evidence were illegal charges of interest and fees, since the accounts were supposed to be written off and closed.
The latest is that Citibank sent both my husband and me apology letters for incorrectly reporting to the credit bureaus. They stated they were sorry for any inconvenience reporting to the credit bureaus may have caused us. However, they did not send an apology for suing my husband and winning in court 4 years past the statute of limitations for lawsuits in my state, nor for reporting 4 years past the 7-year reporting period, which got them the default judgment.
I want people to study their reports carefully. The facts are that the report can only go on for 7 years, and then technically you are in the clear from lawsuits, provided the suit is not re-aged. You can generally tell how long the report is actually supposed to be there by the earliest default date on the report.
So if the default date begins in May 1994, you know the report is supposed to continue on record and be a hassle to you only up to May. Anything reported on your account past May is re-aging the debt. Beware. Get it fixed right away and take the credit reporting agency to court right away, or you may find yourself in a mess a few years down the road, way past the statute of limitations.
If you have no use of your credit card because the bank cut off your credit, remember that you cannot be charged interest and fees without the extension of an open-end credit card. Don't waste time. File in court against any bank that does not follow the FDIC rules. The FDIC protects American banking and its depositors.
If the rules are not followed, the FDIC will not be there to bail out the deposits as promised, because of breach of contract, which these banks are getting away with. Everyone is at risk of losing their deposits should a banking institution go belly-up, regardless of FDIC insurance. The FDIC can only protect deposits if the bank follows the sound banking rules laid down by federal and state laws.
If you think this is good, let's discuss a class action. Let's fix our banking system now before it's too late.
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