<prompt> Human: Hi all -Apologies in advance if this is not the right sub for this question... if not, any redirects would be helpful. But I could really use some advice and would appreciate any thoughts yall have.The basic situation is this: I recently moved cross-country and had to shut down my old ComEd account in the process. I put in an order to pay my last bill via BoA Bill Pay, then deactivated my ComEd account.Heres where it gets tricky: I had a second, already-deactivated account with ComEd from a previous address. The final payment I sent in was apparently credited to that first account, not the account with a debt outstanding.I noticed this online and called ComEd about a month ago. I explained the situation and asked them to take the overpayment from my first account, credit it to my second account, then close them both out permanently. I stayed on the line with the representative while she claimed to be doing exactly that. At the end of the call she assured me that the situation was taken care of and that both accounts were closed.Fast forward to today: I received two pieces of mail ironically at the exact same time - one, a check from ComEd for account overpayment reimbursement, and two, a notice from a collections agency referencing a debt for the exact same amount of money.Needless to say Im incredibly frustrated at this - Im working 80 hoursweek right now and the last thing I want to do is try to navigate this mess with two large bureacratic organizations. Im tempted to just pay the debt collectors the full amount and be done with it wouldnt hurt me financially, since ComEd refunded me the exact same amount - but Im nervous about what that would do to my credit. Thats essentially admitting I was delinquent in payment right?Is there any otherbetter way to go about this? Should I dispute the debt? Do I have any hope of getting out of this mess without a hit to my credit score?Any advice would be incredibly well appreciated. Thank you all.EDIT: Another relevant detail is that the letter was dated 918 but I only received it today I have been traveling the past few weeks. So I may have missed my window the dispute the debt anyways. Is there any way to dispute debt beyond the 30-day window?  <response>: I do not know what course of action should be taken to get the situation figured out, but I do know that you absolutely should not just pay the debt to the collection agency. I made that mistake when I was younger and its still affecting my credit.Worst case you should be able to negotiate with the collection agency to not report. Best case there is some way to void the collection as it was a mistake. Hopefully someone more knowledgeable will chime in. 