No negative record lasts forever, but the clock varies more than most people think: 7 years in the US, 6 in the UK, 5 in Spain and Brazil, 3 in Germany for most records after settlement — and the countdown usually starts on the day the debt went unpaid, not when it was reported. Here are the exact timelines, what restarts the clock and how to get outdated entries removed.
The short answer: it depends on the country
There is no universal expiry date for bad credit. The US Fair Credit Reporting Act sets 7 years for most adverse items; the UK credit reference agencies apply a 6-year rule; Spain and Brazil cap negative registrations at 5 years; Germany deletes most negative entries 3 years after they are settled.
On top of that, each country treats record types differently: a bankruptcy can outlive a simple late payment by years in one country and be deleted in three in another. Knowing which regime applies to your record is the first step to knowing when it will disappear.
United States: 7 years — 10 for bankruptcies
Under the FCRA (15 U.S.C. §1681c), consumer reporting agencies may not report: collections or charged-off accounts after 7 years from the date of delinquency, civil suits, judgments and arrest records after 7 years, and any other adverse item after 7 years. Bankruptcies under Title 11 may be reported for 10 years from the order for relief; in practice, Chapter 13 filings often come off sooner.
Paying an old collection does not remove it in the US — it updates the status to paid, which lenders read better, but the entry stays on the report until the 7-year clock runs out.
United Kingdom: the 6-year rule
Defaults, county court judgments (CCJs) and most other negative records stay for 6 years. GOV.UK puts it plainly for CCJs: records of judgments are kept for 6 years unless you pay the full amount within a month — and the same 6-year window applies to defaults recorded by Experian, Equifax and TransUnion.
Paying a default during those 6 years does not erase it, but it is marked as satisfied, which matters: many lenders simply refuse applicants with unsatisfied defaults while viewing satisfied ones far more favourably.
The US rule: 7 years, and paying does not erase it
In the United States, most adverse items — late payments, collections, charge-offs — stay on your credit report for 7 years under the FCRA, and 10 years for a Chapter 7 bankruptcy. Paying a debt does not remove the entry: it is updated to show a zero balance, but the record stays until the clock runs out. One useful detail: as of 2017 the three nationwide bureaus removed most civil judgments and tax liens from reports, so if you still see one of those, it is worth disputing.
The practical consequence is bigger than the number suggests: in Spain, paying the debt should end the registration — the same is true in Brazil, and in France a payment incident is removed as soon as the creditor declares full repayment — while in the US and UK the entry merely changes status. If you are listed in Spain and you paid, the removal is your right, not a favour.
France, Germany, Brazil: the rest of the map
- France (FICP): payment incidents are removed immediately once the creditor declares full repayment, and cannot be kept beyond 5 years from registration; insolvency measures can be kept up to 7 years, dropping to 5 if the plan runs without incident.
- Germany (SCHUFA): most negative entries are deleted 3 years after they are settled (court-titled debts last until payment, plus 3 more years); an opened consumer insolvency stays 6 years; small debts under 2,000 euros paid within 6 weeks are deleted on proof of payment.
- Brazil (Serasa/SPC): negative records cannot exceed 5 years counted from the debt itself, and once the debt is paid the removal must be immediate.
When does the clock actually start?
In most systems the countdown starts at the delinquency — the date the debt first went unpaid — not when the creditor reported it or when the collection agency bought it. US law is explicit here: the 7 years run from the date of delinquency on the original account.
What restarts the clock is rarer than what people fear: paying does not reset it in the US or UK. What does happen is re-aging — a collector illegally changing the delinquency date to a recent one. That is disputeable everywhere and, in the US, a violation of the FCRA.
How to dispute outdated or inaccurate records
The dispute route depends on jurisdiction, but the pattern is the same: get your report first (free in the US, UK and across the EU), identify the entry and the party that reported it, and file a dispute in writing. In the US, agencies must investigate within about 30 days; in the UK you complain to the credit reference agency and escalate to the ICO; in the EU, the GDPR gives you access and erasure rights backed by national authorities.
Keep every piece of evidence: payment receipts, settlement letters, dates. The disputes that win are the ones a regulator can verify at a glance.
The Google problem: when the record is gone but the search results are not
Even after the entry expires, your name can still surface next to the debt — collection sites, public listings or old notices that were never updated. The official record has an expiry date; search results do not clear themselves.
This is where the right to be forgotten comes in: search engines can be asked to deindex URLs that present an outdated debt as current. It is exactly the gap Digitalbye fills — cleaning what appears when someone googles your name, not only what sits in a database.