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Credit Advice
Topics addressed on August 19, 2009:
You cannot get credit report information for a specific date in the past
Dear Experian,
Is there any way to get information that was on my credit report in August 1994?
- HNT
Dear HNT,
Think about what it would take to produce a report from any day in the past. Experian would have to keep a credit report for every person with a credit history for every day of every year, frozen, just as it was on that day, and there are more than 220 million consumers with credit histories. It’s simply too much information to store.
A credit report is continuously updated with current information and purged of outdated information. The only information that might date back to 1994 would be accounts you opened before then and still use.
Experian retains open, active, positive accounts indefinitely. The accounts have a “first reported” indicator stating how many years ago the account became part of the report. I’ve seen accounts that date back as far as 30 years.
Inactive accounts and negative information, though, are regularly deleted. Most negative information is deleted after seven years. Chapter 7 bankruptcy and unpaid tax liens remain 10 years, and inactive accounts are deleted after 10 years.
Once the information has been deleted it is no longer in Experian’s system and cannot be retrieved.
Thanks for asking.
- The "Ask Experian" team