Old credit card dispute took me 8 months to fix

I had a $37 charge from a gym I canceled in 2022 show up on my credit report last year. The weird part was the gym went out of business in 2023 so I couldn't call them to prove it. I sent three letters to Equifax and got nowhere for months until a friend told me to file a CFPB complaint. That got it removed in 3 weeks flat after fighting it since March. Has anyone else had luck with the CFPB on something like this?

3 comments

3 Comments

the_jesse6d ago

Did you have any documentation from the gym at all? I'm wondering if the CFPB actually contacted them even though they were out of business.

clairec785d ago

Fair enough @the_jesse, but I just don't see how the CFPB would waste time on a closed business.

rowan5935d ago

Oh, I actually read something about this! Apparently the CFPB has a pretty wide reach when it comes to closed businesses. I saw an article that said they can still go after gyms that shut down if there's a pattern of shady billing practices. Like, if the owner just opened and closed multiple places to steal sign-up fees. So even without paperwork from the gym itself, they might have your complaint on file and can use it to build a case if the same people try to open another gym somewhere else. It's kind of wild how much they can do with just a few complaints, honestly. But yeah, you'd think they'd need something from the actual business to prove anything.