Several years ago I had a student loan to the tune of about $12,000. I originally got it from ConCern Loans for Students(?) This was about 13 years ago, I don't remember all the details. Over the years I paid it down to about $3500. It was serviced for awhile by Wachovia, and then EAB. About four years ago EAB stopped sending me statements. I called and asked them what the problem was, they had no explanation. Not having a statement (and having my wife pay the bills) meant that I fell behind a few times, but not seriously. At first they would send me a friendly reminder letter, followed sometimes by a phone call. After a few months, even this stopped. The last thing I got was a letter from Citibank stating that they were taking over the loan. Having no statements, and not knowing where to send the payments to, I stopped paying. No further correspondence was received, no bills, no collections. When I recently pulled my credit reports all three showed Citibank reporting the account included in bankruptcy as of 9/01. I DID have a previous BK (chapter 7) back about 9/98 but this loan was NOT a part of it (they wouldn't let me discharge it at the time).
My question is this: should I dispute and hope for complete deletion, since this account was very obviously screwed up badly by EAB and Citibank? Or should I go for reaffirmation or rehab in the hopes that it would show as a positive (NO lates were ever reported). I have no problem about repaying this debt if they worked with me. Or should I sit on it, since they may remove the BK notation but turn it into a chargeoff, making things worse? Sorry this was a little longer than expected, but I hope to receive some advice. Thanks.