Marcus had a credit score above 800. Then a fraudster opened a credit card in his name, and he didn't find out until the late-payment notices started arriving for an account he'd never opened.
A real Solid Credit member's reports · details changed for privacy
He did everything you're supposed to do. Hours on the phone with the card company, explaining the account wasn't his. Eventually they agreed and reversed the charges. As far as he knew, it was handled.
It wasn't. When Marcus opened a Solid Credit account, the fraudulent account was still sitting on all three of his credit reports, late fees and all, and his score had fallen from over 800 to the low 600s. Clearing it up with the card company had done nothing for his credit file.
Here's the part most people never get told: your bank and the credit bureaus are separate systems. A card issuer reversing a fraudulent charge does not automatically remove that account from your Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion reports. You may need to contact every bureau still reporting the account; don't assume a fix at the issuer will update every file. The company that reported the account (the furnisher) also has a duty to correct information it determines is inaccurate, and because this was identity theft, Marcus could have asked the bureaus to block the fraudulent items using an FTC identity theft report.
So Marcus disputed it (one dispute letter to each bureau) through UltraSolid, and Solid Credit printed and mailed them on his behalf. About a month later, the responses came back: the fraudulent account deleted from all three reports. His score climbed back toward where it started.
The error was never his fault. It just lived in more places than he realized, and no one was going to fix the other three for him until he made them.
One member's experience; outcomes depend on what's on your report and how the bureaus respond.
