<prompt> Human: I have been lurking on this thread for many years and have found that is has always been helpful.My question to you, today, is about Credit Reports.Recently I obtained my Credit Report because my wife and I were going through some financial hardships in the past year and I wanted to see the extent of the damage. Personally, I was in a position where I could not make payments on my credit cards or student loans for 3 months. I thought this financial drought would last for eternity, until my wife came across a large sum of money through the lottery. The amount was large enough to pay of all of her debts and also some of mine. Around the same time I was offered a high paying position at a tech company that am currently at, and am now able to regain financial stability.Needless to say, I knew my credit report and score was going to be bad. I was at about 720 and am now down to 550. Here are my questions, and thank you in advance for any support you can give. I have also posted these questions in creditboards.com, but I find the advice given here to be more effective.1. A lot of the negative debts on the Experian report say This account will be in positive standing in 2018. What does this mean? I did not have debt collectors on these accounts, and many are now paid off completely, which I thought would come off my credit report a lot quicker than that. If these accounts have been paid, is there anything I can do to get that off my record?2. I have credit cards that closed on me. On my Equifax report, it says under current status: PAYS AS AGREED. What does this mean? Does this mean once they are paid off they will come off my record? 3. There is a medical bill that was in collections, that was paid off in 2005 but is still on my record. Is it possible to get this off this late in the game?4. The status of my closed accounts say Closed by Grantors RequestIs there a better way to have those closed accounts listed? Would it be worth writing to those accounts to see if they would say, Paid Off or whatever other term would be more beneficial?5. Creditboards.com and posts on here have mentioned that you should challenge any and everything on your credit report. I cant find a definite answer on this though, so maybe someone here and set me straight. Are you to challenge even the things you know you were at fault for? Everything Ive read has sort of glossed over this and I am curious if that is for legal purposes or not.I appreciate any advice you can give. Thank you.  <response>: Alright here we go. Im going to try to answer each item in a separate comment.A lot of the negative debts on the Experian report say This account will be in positive standing in 2018.What does this mean? I did not have debt collectors on these accounts, and many are now paid off completely, which I thought would come off my credit report a lot quicker than that. If these accounts have been paid, is there anything I can do to get that off my record?This means that there are some negative notations for this account such as late payments. By law, those negative marks must come off of your credit report after 7 years. Paying the accounts off does not remove the negative factors from your report.Once they are paid, the only way to have them removed is to send a goodwill latter asking them nicely to remove them as a favor to you. You are pretty much at their mercy on this. 