Metro-2: The Formatting Standard Behind Every Tradeline

What Metro-2 is

Metro-2 is the standardized data format banks, collectors, and other furnishers use to transmit account information to the credit bureaus. It's not just free text — it's structured fields (balance, past-due amount, account status, dates) that are supposed to follow consistent, internally logical rules.

Logical impossibilities worth knowing

A few patterns show up more often than you'd expect, and each one indicates the reported data can't be correct as stated:

A $0 balance with a positive past-due amount. If nothing is owed, nothing can be past due. These two fields contradict each other.

Past-due exceeding the total balance. You can't be behind on more than you owe in total — the past-due figure is supposed to be a portion of the balance, not larger than it.

A closed account still reporting a past-due balance. Once an account is closed, it shouldn't continue accruing or reporting new delinquency activity tied to ongoing payments.

Why these matter

These aren't judgment calls about whether a debt is legitimate — they're internal contradictions in the furnisher's own data. When a tradeline reports information that can't logically be true simultaneously, that's a data-accuracy problem the furnisher is obligated to fix or the bureau is obligated to remove.