Metro 2 Payment History Profile Code E: Zero Balance and Current Account

Specification

Code	E
Meaning	Zero Balance and Current Account
Field	Payment History Profile (Field 18)
Record	Base Segment
Length / position	24 chars · 112–135
Category	Current
CRRG reference	CRRG Base Segment field definition, Payment History Profile

E is a positive character. It says the account was open, owed nothing, and was not delinquent that month.
E exists for revolving products, where a zero balance on an open account is common. An installment loan with a zero balance is normally paid and closed and reports Account Status 13.
E is not a dispute indicator. A consumer dispute is reported through the Compliance Condition Code (for example XB), not through the payment history.
E sits on the good end of the scale alongside 0. It is never used to mask a delinquency.

1A cardholder pays the statement balance in full each month and has no new purchases, so the account shows a zero balance at the cycle date.
2A home equity line of credit is open with nothing drawn for several months.
3A revolving account is paid to zero in the month before it is closed at the consumer's request.

Use E for a month in which a card or line of credit had a zero balance and was current.
Use 0 for a current month with a balance. E and 0 are both positive; E adds that nothing was owed.
Do not use E on an account that was past due, even with a small balance; report the delinquency character instead.

A file can be structurally valid and still be wrong. These are the cross-field conditions Payment History Profile Code E has to satisfy.

E belongs to revolving and line-of-credit portfolio types (R and C).
Payment Rating has no E value, so an E in position 1 is reconciled against Account Status.
A month reported as E carries no delinquency and does not affect the Date of First Delinquency.