What to do When Your Credit Report is Wrong
Posted on May 29th, 2009 in Uncategorized |
1. You must have a copy of your credit report.You should look at your credit regularly even if you have good credit.You do this to see if all the information is correct because your credit history will affect more than just loan applications. Catching identity theft is also a reason to check your credit.
2. Explore all sections of the credit report.You can find out if there are any errors by doing this.Examining your credit for identity thieves will keep you safe from them.
3. Look for things in your report that should not be there.Make a note of the positive entries in the credit report also.The Fair Credit Reporting Act states that a creditor must notify you of any negative information they are reporting so keep a record of all documentation they send you.If you find a negative entry and you were not notified about it then FCRA states they have to remove the entry.
4. Check all of the items you think are wrong and send it in a dispute letter to the credit agencies. Register the mail so you can keep track of when they received the letter.By law they have to respond within a certain number of days so the registered letter will let you know when the time started for them.
5. Keep track of any correspondence with them. Write down dates, times, and who you talked to and any results you may have found.You want to look like you are in charge of your credit so make all your records easily available to you to dispute anything that needs to disputed.
6. When you get the results, look over them carefully. Your results will have a summary of the changes the credit bureau made.Make a comparison of your notes and the agencies changes to make sure the results are right.
7. If you still have unsettled disputes do the steps again until you are satisfied with the findings.Get them to investigate the dispute as many times as it takes to get it fixed, it will not cost extra.
