I completed my Six Year Aperture IVA on 23rd April 2019 .. this is my experience of my first 4 weeks ..
My final payment left my bank on 21st April 2019.
Aperture text me on 21st April 2019 - it said 'Congratulations' and they were completing my IVA and my closure paperwork was on its way.
On 29th May, I received my completion certificate from Aperture and a nice letter to say congratulations for successfully completing my IVA.
(Much quicker than I had expected due to some other's experiences on here). But my certificate arrived one month after my IVA finished.
I noticed the Insolvency Register was amended about 2 weeks after I had completed my IVA - it was shown as 'Satisfied' on their website. I understand that drops off their website 3 months after the satisfied. My Aperture Supervisor had contacted them as part of their closure procedures.
My adverse credit reports started dropping off my Equifax file automatically when each account reached its six-year anniversary - as detailed in 'Date Satisfied' section. 3 months before I completed my IVA - I paid £7.95 a month to join Equifax. This was a really useful service which helped me monitor the last few weeks of my IVA and get my credit file updated and accurate.
I regularly checked each of the credit report entries shown on my Equifax file and I had to get 9 of them corrected via Equifax Customer Services as I noticed there was an incorrect date shown in the 'Date Satisfied' field. (There shouldn't be a date shown later than the date when the IVA was approved. In my case 23.4.2013). That was a very straight forward process, that Equifax helped with. 8 out of 9 creditors that Equifax contacted on my behalf promptly amended their incorrect information on my credit file - that took about a month to get sorted. The only creditor that didn't respond at all was SANTANDER. They left their 'Satisfied' date as showing one month after the IVA date, they didn't respond to Equifax or my queries. That was frustrating as I had to wait a further month for their inaccurate data to drop off my record, but it did eventually.
A few days after my IVA had finished - I could still see the Court Information on my Equifax file, despite it being more than 6 years after it started. I contacted Equifax Customer Services and they removed it within 24 hours, because it was over six years old.
I also noted on Equifax that 2 of the old credit reports hadn't dropped off my file after the six year anniversary (all the others had dropped off automatically) so Equifax Customer Services removed those within 24 hours too.
I didn't join Experian because their fees were a pricey £14.95 a month, but I have ordered my free Experian report (which you can get once a year) to check all the information is correct on that too.
My Equifax Credit score for the last six years has been steadily 'FAIR' at around 375 points. When I checked it today it has shot up overnight to
528 - 'EXCELLENT' and there is no record of any of the old credit reports or the IVA Court information. The only thing Equifax suggests I can do now to improve my score further is apply for a Credit Card!
For those of you yet to complete your IVA - hang on in there.. you knew it would be tough, but it's worth the wait. I read this forum regularly over the last six years and it gave me strength to get through tough times. We all have them.
Thank you IVA.CO.UK for a helpful and useful site and for all you bloggers out there who helped me get through it and to Equifax who helped me query inaccurate data which helped me repair my credit file a lot sooner than if they hadn't intervened.
Signing out - with thanks.
