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The Secrets Of Credit Repair (Part 3)
Divorce And CreditThe credit and money-related problems that can accompany a divorce used to primarily affect ..... ...... inaccurate credit reports due to credit bureau errors and that those consumers represent a threat to the credit bureau. Sending your Disputes When you mail your dispute, you should include the original copy of the credit report with your dispute letter. You will be amused to note that the credit bureaus take space in their literature to convince you that your credit cannot be "repaired." In TRW's words, "No one can have accurate, current, and verifiable information removed from your credit report." Take note that even TRW admits that accurate information can be removed if it is not verifiable. You must send your dispute letters via certified mail, return receipt requested. This means you must go to a post office to mail every dispute. Certified mail, return receipt requested, will cost more than a dollar extra, but it will demonstrate that you are serious about your correspondence. Without certified mail, return receipt requested, you would have no record of the credit bureau receiving your letter nor the date they received it. When you receive the return receipt in the mail, make sure to staple it to your copy of the original dispute in your file. Don't hold disputes until you have a full set of credit reports. Send each dispute as soon as it is ready, as long as it is 90 days after your last dispute to the credit bureau.
Getting a Response You will receive one of eight types of response to your dispute:
No response at all.
A stall letter asking for more information.
A rejection based on the timing of your dispute.
A rejection letter on the grounds that the dispute is "frivolous or irrelevant."
A rejection based on the grounds that the credit bureau believes you are manipulating the system.
Fair Debt CollectionFTC, August 1996 If you use credit cards, owe money on a personal loan, or are paying on a home mortgage, you are a 'debtor.' If .....
A letter announcing that your investigation has begun.
A letter announcing that your dispute has been forwarded to the appropriate credit bureau.
A new credit report showing the results of an investigation.
Don't be discouraged if you receive multiple stalls or rejections. Remember, restoring your credit isn't easy. If you decided to restore your own credit, you knew from this text that you would encounter delays. Each case requires a different response. However, you should remember this rule of thumb: the credit bureau is a bureaucracy; you shouldn't expect the credit bureau to react as though it were an individual. There is no single person handling your case. If you type out a ferocious counter-letter in response to the credit bureau's rejection or stall, the credit bureau employee who receives it will have little idea why you are fuming.
Usually, it is better to simply write the dispute again. Here are some guidelines to reacting to the eight types of credit bureau responses:
1. No response at all: 52 days after you sent your dispute, if you haven't heard anything from the credit bureau, you may assume that your dispute was ignored. There is really little you can do except to document the lapse and draft another dispute. This dispute should mention the previous ignored dispute as well as certified mail number of that dispute. The new dispute should be more threatening than the first.
2. A stall letter asking for more information: Often, if your dispute alleged that someone else's file was merged with your own, the credit bureau will send this type of stall. A new dispute should be drafted basically repeating the first dispute (but doesn't allege that your file was merged) and includes all information requested by the credit bureau response. You may remind the bureau that this information was previously included in the credit report that accompanied the first dispute. This second letter should be more threatening than the first dispute.
Credit Card InsightsThe cards we are going to discus here are the MasterCard and Visa only. Banks and Savings & Loans issue .....
3. A rejection based on the timing of the dispute: If you sent a dispute before 90 days after your last dispute, you will likely earn this response. Also, if the credit bureau sees that you have sent in many disputes, they may choose to brush you off with this rejection. You must respond by becoming more demanding. If they had finished the job properly with the first dispute, you wouldn't be forced to dispute the listings again! Send another dispute, much like the first, and insist on immediate action.
4. A rejection based on the grounds the dispute is "frivolous or irrelevant." This type of response would infuriate any consumer. Maybe the bureau thinks you are working with a credit repair company, or maybe they think that you will not stand up to an initial rejection, and they may even ask you to pay for their investigation. You must prove them wrong by becoming even more insistent and threatening in your disputes. Send the same dispute over again with some additional substantiation.
5. A rejection on the grounds that the credit bureau believes you are manipulating the system: The rejection letter may imply that you are working with a credit repair company, or that you are unduly barraging them with disputes. As a consumer who has been treated unfairly, these are not your problems. Insist, in another dispute, that the credit bureau is responsible for conducting the investigation and they are taking a very unwise risk in rejecting your dispute. All you want is your credit report properly corrected.
6. A letter announcing that an investigation has begun. Trans Union will usually send these letters as a clever way of extending their 30 day investigation period. You really have no choice but to accept their timetable. Just place the letter in the file and watch closely for the response to arrive on the date indicated in the letter. If no response comes, see item number one on the list.
7. A letter announcing that your dispute has been forwarded to the appropriate credit bureau. If there is a local credit bureau involved in your dispute, the main credit bureau will forward your dispute to that bureau for verification. Count on an additional two week delay when this occurs.
8. A new credit report showing the results of an investigation. This is the desired result. When you receive your new report, you should copy and carefully analyze the credit report for deletions or changes to perfect.
Seeing Results
If Someone Owes You MoneyIf you are owed money and have not received any payment over a reasonable period of time, there are several steps you can .....
The easiest way to analyze the results of a successful challenge is to compare the newly investigated report with the previous report. You may simply go down the list of negative items and note the absences of negative listings or listings that were negative, but have become positive. You may also determine improvements by comparing information within the same credit report. Equifax and Trans Union now usually provide a list of items challenged and whether or not the items were changed, deleted, or verified as accurate. TRW has a list of items challenged at the back of the credit report. You may compare this list with the negatives remaining on the credit report to determine what progress has been made.
As you receive the results of the credit bureau investigation, you will note that each disputed listing will have been handled in one of five different ways:
1. The disputed listing was not investigated. Perhaps your dispute was not sufficiently clear, or perhaps the credit bureau simply chose to ignore your dispute. In either case, you will need to dispute the item again in your next dispute letter.
2. The disputed item was investigated but verified as accurate. The creditor may have responded to the credit bureau's request for reverification, or the credit bureau may have simply faked the investigation to get you off their back. You have the right to dispute the listing again at a future time. In fact, the FTC has determined that the credit bureau may become responsible, in future disputes, to look deeper into the disputed item than simply asking the creditor to check their computer records.
3. The disputed listing was investigated as to the correctness of the information within the listing such as late pay notations, and the listing was found to be inaccurate or unverifiable. In this case, the negative listing will now show up as a positive listing. This is the best possible outcome because now you will enjoy good credit once your report is cleared.
4. The disputed listing was investigated as to whether or not the listings belong to you, and the listing was found to be inaccurate or unverifiable. In this case, the negative listing will disappear from the credit report altogether.
5. The disputed listing was deleted or improved to perfect, but the negative listing was later verified and re-listed on the credit report. If a listing is verified by the creditor after the thirty day investigation period, the credit bureau can replace the listing on the credit report. When this occurs, see item number two. Whatever your response, restoring your credit is a cycle. If you receive disappointing results, remember that it took you some time to create your bad credit, and it will take a little time to restore your good credit. Collect your results, mark your calendar, and wait for the next acceptable dispute date. Don't forget to allow at least sixty days between disputes.
Fourth Quarter Strategies
Wipe Out DebtIn 1938 a federal law was passed known as the Wage Earner Plan. It is administered by the same branch of our courts that .....
The more you dispute the negative listings on your file, the more difficult it becomes to get a new investigation started. As you find the frequency of investigations and deletions dwindling, you must consider these Fourth Quarter Strategies.
Threats
Remember, the checker must sense that you are a legal threat to the credit bureau; that you might sue them if they don't follow through with their obligations. There are several reasonable threats to the credit bureaus that may make them stand up and take notice of your dispute -- regardless of how many times they've previously looked into the negative listing.
1. "I have contacted a lawyer and am considering a lawsuit." Every day the credit bureaus are embroiled in consumer lawsuits, costing the credit bureaus hundreds of thousands of dollars in awards given to consumers. The credit bureaus pay even more to maintain the legal staff necessary to handle these cases. Technically, you may sue the credit bureaus every time they fail to comply with the Fair Credit Reporting Act. However, the most viable lawsuits are those from consumers with negative consumer information not belonging to them listed on the report. You must be careful about threatening to sue anyone. If you say, "I am going to sue you," you must really be intent on filing suit. You may, in any case, express your consideration of a lawsuit or steps you have taken to proceed with preliminary work, such as seeking counsel with an attorney. This threat shouldn't be overused, but don't forget that an average consumer being mistreated by the credit bureaus would almost always make such a threat. If you fail to mention the option of a lawsuit, your dispute will lack punch, especially after you have submitted numerous previous disputes.
2. "I am filing a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission." The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) regulates and monitors the activities of the credit bureaus. The credit bureaus won't be crushed by a single complaint, but they would rather limit the number of complaints received by the FTC each year. As it now stands, the credit bureaus are the number one source of consumer complaints to the FTC. In order to file a complaint with the FTC, you may write: Federal Trade Commission Pennsylvania Ave. and Sixth St., N.W. Washington, D.C. 20580 WWW: www.ftc.gov Make sure that your complaint is brief and to the point. You may wish to include a copy of the complaint in your dispute letter and threaten to mail the complaint if you don't receive satisfaction within thirty days.
3. "I am preparing letters to my state senators and representatives." Every year, the credit bureaus fight off new legislation which would further restrict their practices and place greater financial penalties on their mistakes. Presently, they enjoy only the constraint of a 25 year-old statute that is, advantageously for them, outdated. In Congress, when a new, tougher, Fair Credit Reporting Act reaches the floor, the credit bureaus are forced to labor to keep the new act from passing. So far, they have succeeded in preventing changes to the Fair Credit Reporting Act, but as time goes on, and more consumers complain to their congressmen, fewer congressmen are willing to listen to the credit bureaus. Letters to federal and state congressmen that express outrage over the conduct of the credit bureaus will eventually change credit reporting as we know it. The credit bureaus want to delay that change, and they will shrink at your decision to write your local statesman. Feel free to send copies of your complaint letters with your dispute.
Settling your Debts
If you haven't yet settled your outstanding, delinquent debts, you must seriously consider doing so. Many of your creditors will see the negative listing on your credit report as a collection tool, and they will do whatever it takes to keep that negative listing on the report, even if it requires verifying a thousand investigations. Even if you delete a negative unpaid listing, that negative listing may well reappear when the creditor or collector settles the account, seeks a judgment, or passes the amount to collections. Please see Settling Delinquent Debts for more information.
Disputing the Information with the Source Sooner or later in this process, you should dispute the credit information with the creditor who reported it. If you are in a hurry to restore your credit, you should be writing your creditors from day one. If you have worked with the credit bureaus for some time and the results are lagging, now would be a good time to take the fight directly to the source.
Submitting a 100 Word Statement of Explanation
Most do-it-yourself credit repair manuals recommend that you file a 100 word statement to be added to your credit report explaining the circumstances of the negative credit that remains. After all, the Fair Credit Reporting Act does give you that right. We have never seen a creditor who bothered to read or consider the 100 word statement. In fact, many creditors won't look much beyond the automatic credit bureau rating that appears with your credit report when you apply for credit. This instruction does not recommend that you file the 100 word statement. It would only serve to self-verify information that should come off through repeated disputation of the listing. If you have previously submitted any 100 word statements, they should be the first items you remove.
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