Your credit score truly is your permanent record

There is an article in today’s Wall Street Journal titled “A New Threat To Your Credit Rating: Unpaid parking tickets, library fees start to hurt consumer credit as strapped cities seek payment.” I can’t find an online link yet, but doing a Google search on several of the terms in the title and subtitle yielded many hits for local stories relaying the same type of story.

Summary: As some cities are facing budget crunches, many are using private collection companies to assist them in chasing down fines and fees owed to them. An outstanding balance on an account handled by a private collection company can be reported to a credit agency—each city determines whether or not such information gets reported.

According to the article, “A library fine reported to a credit bureau, for example, can knock as much as 100 points off a credit score….” Here is a list of cities they mentioned turning to collection agencies, and these are just a sampling:

Overdue parking violations—Philadelphia, San Diego, Chicago, Seattle, Austin, Miami
Unpaid library fines—New York, Baltimore, Portland (Oregon), Dallas
Late E-ZPass toll bills: coming to New York state

I'm sure it's only a matter of time before Blockbuster, Hollywood Video, and other companies that can charge late fees follow suit.