So before I went back to school I needed a laptop. I had cash, but I was trying to finance as much as possible. I didn't know when I would have an income again, so I wanted to keep available cash as high as I could.

Dell Credit looked like a bad idea from the start. They had no interest deals for 6 months, but I knew I couldn't pay it off in 6 months anyway. I knew I would be paying 24% or so from the start. I was prepared for that.

Fast forward 1 year. My $1050 laptop still showed a balance of $965 after 12 payments of ~$85. Holy ****. On the plus side I finally had a job that was paying me.

I started making payments of $250. After 3 months of payments at $250 my balance went to $685 from $965...HOW DOES THAT EVEN WORK?. I was pissed.

So, about 4 months ago I went onto their website to look into things. There were all kinds of charges and fees for not paying off the laptop in 6 months and all this other junk. I was so pissed. I just wanted to pay it off. There was a shiny yellow button that said "PAY OFF CARD" on the sidebar. I clicked the shiny button.

I paid the card off to $0. I even printed the statement with $0 on it. I was proud of myself.

I moved apartments. I didn't get the memo.

Today I received a collection notice in the mail for $14.95. Dell Credit said that I was 4 months late on my balance of $10.00. Aparently "Pay Off" and "$0" means nothing at Dell. I ran a credit report and saw that I had a "Charge Off" and 120 day delinquency. I called Dell Credit and yelled at some poor customer service people to make myself feel better. "Yes I know you can't ****ing help me. No, I don't want you to actually do anything. I just want you to listen to me yell and assure me that this $14.95 will make me never ever ever EVER have to hear from you people again." (basically there was a pending charge or interest or pay off fee...put in there to ruin lives or something)

The moral of my story is: $0 doesn't mean $0 if they can still ruin your credit somehow.

On top of that: if you have my phone number AND email address...why would you ruin my credit before sending an email or trying to call? OHH, because you want to let the balance stay out and grow at insane interest rates, because you KNOW I'll be paying that extra $20 to get rid of you. I feel that if you don't make all attempts to contact me via available means...you should NOT be able to ding my credit. This is $10 that put my FICO down about 100 pts.

 

"dude, you shouldnt have gotten a Dell....."

 

y did u get a dell? Lol. thats the question here....

 

Yeah, that's probably due to finance charges for the half month (or so) from when the last statement to the when you paid it off. Not saying its right, but it gets people all the time. If you carried a balance, there will more than likely be some number of days that you carried a balance the month you paid it all off. Sucks man. Especially with the address change, it got all screwy

 

damn, that's some crazy **** Jon! I hope iron that thing out soon if it hasn't already... best of luck!

 

it's the deferred finance charges from your promo period of 0% interest that rocketed your balance those few hundred bucks.
kinda shady with credit cards as your current balance is not an actual pay-off quote since interest is charged daily.
helps to check your report for free once a year https://www.annualcreditreport.com/

 

Take it as a lesson learned. Anything over 8% is a big no-no imo. You could probably get a better rate from your street corner loanshark.

 

which model from dell did u get?

i was guna buy the vostro. their financial side maybe crappy but arent the laptops themselves decent?

 

Yes they are

 

My current laptop i bought on Del credit in 2004. It was $750. I paid $100/mo and paid it off with $150 on the last month. I paid on time, and made sure to mail the check out within a few days of getting my statement in the mail.

I have to say that the interest rates are freaking atrocious! But, you may not have realized that having that high of a rate means some huge amounts of money going to paying interest instead principal.

Paying for things, put extra down on the ones with highest interest first.

 

You do realize that if its not an accurate entry you CAN challenge it with the evidence you have and get it removed, right?

 

were you missing payments or something? was this a promotional finance that wasn't paid off in time (accrued finance charges)?

something else is going on there... even at 24% apr, there's no reason you sould have paid as much as you did.

 

Dell is evil. When my mom bought a desktop, they sent her a pack of photo paper a few months later and charged her account for it without even telling her.

 

The only reason for my rant was this: If you have someone's contact information use it.

This company went out of their way to ding my credit rather than call me and say "You ever going to pay this?" I had zero argument or dispute over the balance. I understand that it was just interest that accrued in the month where i paid the card off. I just did not know I had a balance until I got a collection notice in the mail for 120 days past due. Further, don't put a "Pay My Card Off" button on your website if it doesn't properly calculate the amount due.

All my fault I know...but that doesn't change the fact that they used very poor business practices. They probably spent at least $50 in personnel wages and fees to credit agencies in order to ding my credit for $14.95... a $14.95 I would have paid if I just got an email or a phone call. I hate snail mail, and I move so much I have it all sent to my dad's house or I'd never get half of it.

P.S. I never buy store/brand desktops, because I build my own for gaming...but with laptops you're kinda stuck. I got the Dell, because it was a good value for the money at the time and I could finance it to get me through school when I wasn't working.