The document discusses the Date of Last Activity (DOLA) and Date of First Delinquency (DOF) on credit reports. The DOLA refers to the most recent transaction on an account, while the DOFD refers to when a payment was first 30 days late. The DOFD is important because it determines how long negative items stay on a report. However, credit reports sometimes list the DOLA instead of the DOFD, causing confusion over how long items remain. The Fair Credit Reporting Act states that the DOFD must be used to calculate timelines for removing derogatory information. Consumers can contact credit bureaus to request the specific date an item will be deleted from their report

1. DOLA (Date of Last Activity) and DOFD (Date of First
Delinquency)
One of the most important things in your credit report is the DOLA or the date of last activity. It
can refer to any transaction made on the account, whether it refers to the last payment made,
when it charged off and was sold to a collection agency, or when it was updated after a dispute
was investigated. The DOLA changes whenever new activity is recorded on your account.
The DOFD or the date of first delinquency, on the other hand, refers to the time when you first
became 30 days late on your payment and never made any action to make the account current.
Subsequently, the account got charged off. The DOFD is also crucial because this is actually the
starting point for computing when the negative items listed above will be removed from your
credit report.
Both the DOLA and the DOFD are confusing for a lot of consumers because one is often
mistaken for the other. This can be devastating for individuals with a number of delinquencies
because in some states even the mere acknowledgment of a debt can change the DOLA. So
now the question arises: Which is used to determine how long a derogatory listing will remain
in your credit report—the DOLA or the DOFD?
The Federal Trade Commission is clear about this under the Fair Credit Reporting Act’s
Compliance/Obsolescence Date. The FTC tells creditors: “If you report information about a
delinquent account that’s placed for collection, charged to profit or loss, or subject to any
similar action, you must, within 90 days after you report the information, notify the CRA (credit
reporting agency) of the month and the year of the commencement of the delinquency that
immediately preceded your action. This will ensure the CRAs use the correct date when
computing how long derogatory information can be kept in a consumer’s file.”
Obviously, it is the DOFD that is used to determine when the statute of limitations of a debt will
start and when it will end. Once the DOFD has been established, it cannot be changed. The
problem is that it is often the DOLA that appears on the credit report and not the DOFD. For
two credit agencies, namely Experian and Transunion, the date when the negative information
will be deleted from their records is stated on the credit report. Equifax, meanwhile, uses the
DOLA as the DOFD. This is also another source of confusion for many consumers.

2. If you want to be certain when a particular item will be expunged from the credit bureau’s
records, you can write their customer service department detailing your request. Simply ask
them to give you the FCRA Compliance/Obsolescence Date, specifically the month and year the
item in question will be removed from your credit report. Remember that this is not a dispute
letter but simply a request so you don’t need to send it to the dispute department of the credit
bureau.
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