For all you people with crappy credit

[picantel]

The best time of the year for disputes with the credit bureaus is almost upon us. I will explain below.

First of all, some of you know you can get your credit reports for free(federal law) once per year at www.annualcreditreport.com . You do not get the scores- just a free look at your report. Remember also if you choose the free route and dispute an item with the bureaus they get 45 days to investigate instead of the normal 30. In this case I highly recommend you purchase your credit reports from each bureau.

Now comes the meat of the whole process. Firstly, there are different opinions on how to dispute. Some state send in the dispute certified mail return receipt requested and some say it is easier to dispute online. If you use the mail it is a little tricker so try and get your mailing to the credit bureau by November 25th. If you can get it by the 26th that is even better but there is a risk involved. If you use online dispute then start the investigation in the evening of the 26th. I would test the online dispute process first a week earlier(do not finish it) as sometimes they will deny you.

Why this time period? Well think about it. The credit bureaus get 30 days to finish a dispute i.e. the creditors, collection agencies, ect get 30 days to respond. Should they fail to respond the tradeline in question is deleted. The 30 day period in this case covers thanksgiving and christmas- a time taken up by vacations and a time in which both the bureaus and the creditors are severely short staffed. If you dispute on the 26th(which is day one) the bureaus will not even get to your dispute until 6 days later. Also, 10s of thousands of people use this period to dispute so they are inundated with investigations.

will it work? Depends on your luck of course. However, this is your best time to give it a shot to get those pesky negative tradelines off your credit for good. For those who think this is unethical believe me after 8 years of seeing what these people do to keep your scores down I hardly feel sorry for them. I could tell you horror stories.

[MastaB]

Wow thanks for the info i might give this a try.

Has it worked for you in the past, even when you were in the wrong?

[fiveteamer]

I stiffed Rogers Cable some years ago, I should try and get that off.

[picantel]

Wow thanks for the info i might give this a try.

Has it worked for you in the past, even when you were in the wrong?

In 8 years I have helped thousands of people with credit. Yes it has worked many many times. Case in point. The last girl I helped had 32 negatives on her credit report. She now has 2.

Wrong or right does not matter. It is simply a case of will they get to your dispute before time runs out. Remember if you choose the free route those 15 extra days they get will be the killer so if you have an extra $40 for 3 reports why not take a chance I always say

[MastaB]

she got 30 marks off in one year????

Or is there a limit that you can dispute?

[picantel]

yep 30 marks off. Online has a limit but just put in 2 disputes is all(equifax that is) transunion and experian do not have online limits. If you have a capital one card that is bad you may want to leave it alone. They will sue you on a dime and you may not want to draw their attention.

Remember also. 1/3 of your score deals with negatives. If you have credit cards with larger balances i.e. over 30% that is doing as much damage to your credit as that collection agency tradeline. If you are interested in seeing a general consensus on what kind of credit you can get go to www.orchardbank.com and fill out an application. They will pull a soft report the first time(no harm to your credit) and tell you what card you qualify for. If you continue then they will pull a hard but if you are offered a secured card then your score is in the dump lol. Also remember cc companies have severely cut back on credit in this economy.

[bigugly]

Having a large balance on your credit card hurts you credit?

I have a no interest card for a year and I am letting it stay full for most of the year. When it comes time to payup or switch to 30% interest on my balance I am totally going to pay it off. Is this hurting my credit?

[MastaB]

Having a large balance on your credit card hurts you credit?

I have a no interest card for a year and I am letting it stay full for most of the year. When it comes time to payup or switch to 30% interest on my balance I am totally going to pay it off. Is this hurting my credit?

Definitely. I would suggest keeping you balance under 20% of your limit. Picantel might be able to shed some more light upon this.

[MastaB]

yep 30 marks off. Online has a limit but just put in 2 disputes is all(equifax that is) transunion and experian do not have online limits. If you have a capital one card that is bad you may want to leave it alone. They will sue you on a dime and you may not want to draw their attention.

Remember also. 1/3 of your score deals with negatives. If you have credit cards with larger balances i.e. over 30% that is doing as much damage to your credit as that collection agency tradeline. If you are interested in seeing a general consensus on what kind of credit you can get go to www.orchardbank.com and fill out an application. They will pull a soft report the first time(no harm to your credit) and tell you what card you qualify for. If you continue then they will pull a hard but if you are offered a secured card then your score is in the dump lol. Also remember cc companies have severely cut back on credit in this economy.

So only dispute 2 on equifax. And dispute all of the marks with transunion and experian?

[smitch124]

even having a large unused credit limit can hurt your ability to get more credit...

[bigugly]

Crap. I never even knew that.

How about once you pay it all off. Is there still a lot of damage left?

I thought by getting credit and paying it off it builds your credit up...

[smitch124]

well its not really damage, it just means the more credit you have available to you the harder it is to get more.

[jjgold]

I stiffed PSEG over 5k, stiffed Verizon over 3k, stiffed credit card company over 10k and still have a high credit rating

[SlickFazzer]

I stiffed PSEG over 5k, stiffed Verizon over 3k, stiffed credit card company over 10k and still have a high credit rating

[The Seer]

So do you need to dispute an item with each agency? I mean say for instance you have 2 items to dispute. Do you need to dispute both of them with all 3 agencies?

[picantel]

So only dispute 2 on equifax. And dispute all of the marks with transunion and experian?

No I mean do all the disputes they let you and if you need more put in a 2nd investigation for the remaining items.

[Brock Landers]

I stiffed PSEG over 5k, stiffed Verizon over 3k, stiffed credit card company over 10k and still have a high credit rating

how'd you get around judegments or collection agencies? Has it been more than 7 years for those debts you listed JJ?

[picantel]

So do you need to dispute an item with each agency? I mean say for instance you have 2 items to dispute. Do you need to dispute both of them with all 3 agencies?

let us say you have a collection agency tradeline that is on all 3 bureau credit reports. You need to dispute it with each bureau in a separate dispute and each one will do its own investigation. It is not unheard of that for example 2 are deleted and 1 is verified. Experian is famous for verifying stuff without, in my opinion, actually doing the dispute. I once put a tradeline in dispute with experian at 10:30 at night and at 11 it had been verified. Yah right.

[picantel]

Crap. I never even knew that.

How about once you pay it all off. Is there still a lot of damage left?

I thought by getting credit and paying it off it builds your credit up...

paying stuff off does help your credit but leaving a big balance on your credit cards will kill your score. There are a million different things that affect your credit also. Let us say you have one credit card with a $1000 limit and $800 balance. You are taking a hit for that individual card being over 30%, 50%, and 75%. You are also taking a hit for your overall revolving credit usage being so high since you have just one card. Obviously if you have more cards the overall picture will change. Remember store charge cards like target, best buy, ect are also revolving credit and yes those home equity lines of credit you may have taken out are also revolving credit.

[robmpink]

I have some questions/different scenarios. Should these instances be disputed

#1 Say a credit card that was charged off and you paid a settlement offer. It shows "accepted a settlement" on the credit report. If so, what do you dispute? That you paid the entire amount? It seems that you can't dispute anything in this case.

#2 Should you dispute not actuall credit accounts, but the companies that are listed since they reviewed your credit? Would removing some of them make your score better?

#3 Also what exactly is the best dispute w/ a legitimate debt? Identity theft, you did pay on time, etc?

[picantel]

1)settlement offers are horrible on your credit i.e. almost bad as a BK. They put on profit/loss tags and hurt your credit. Even worse, unless you get something in writing stating they are settled in full and you owe nothing further cc companies will often resell the remaining part to a collection agency who will tag you for the other amount. I have seen it thousands of times. transunion offers up to 2 disputes per item so I would check paid in full and something about it not being reported correctly or never late. You can also do a simple 'not mine'.

2)I am not sure if you are talking about disputing inquiries or the actual tradelines. Equifax will let you dispute inquiries if you call in as a simple not mine. Watch to make sure they do not tag your account with a fraud alert though. Transunion and experian may or may not let you. I sued experian because they refused inquiries disputes, won my case, and still they refused. Yes removing inquiries will improve your credit score. If you mean dispute credit accounts then you do these through the credit bureaus. A cc company does not have to respond a dispute directly from you. A collection agency though is another matter. You dispute with them, wait a day, then dispute with the credit bureaus. Reporting is considered further collection and they cannot collect with an open dispute hence they are not allowed to report a disputed debt. If it is already on your credit and they verify then they must put a notation that it is disputed by the consumer. To not do so is a violation of the fdcpa.

3)identity theft is a bad dispute as they will tag you with a fraud alert making very difficult to get new credit. As for how to dispute see #1.

[bigugly]

Thanks for the tips man I appreciate it. Thanks for the thread, although it doesn't really apply to me at the moment!

[MickChunky]

Very good info

[The Seer]

Picantel, pmed you with a question.

[robmpink]

I hit em up hard today. I'm really thinking this could work out somewhat. I went to the credit union today for business and when I was done stopped in the loan department. I had a loan w/ them 2 years ago and was 120 past due at one point. The loan has been paid off for awhile. Anyway, I asked the loan officer, who remembered me, if I dispute that it was paid on time would they be fine with it, she said just dispute it and it will be fine.

Other then this conversation I disputed late payments. I'll let you know how it turns out.

[robmpink]

Bump, for people who may need to look into this and didn't see it last year. Personally, I can attribute this thread with somewhat helping me get a house 4 months later. I tried what he said and a couple things were changed at just the right time. Other things weren't.

[robmpink]

Bump once more. If you want to try this now is the time you need to get everything together and you should dispute the things this Tues or Weds. It sure helped me a bit last year.

[CashMoney]

Good short term fix but if they remove the negatives for the 30 day period it's just a matter of time before the creditors will report the same crap again. The only thing that fixes credit is time.

[losturmarbles]

even having a large unused credit limit can hurt your ability to get more credit...

not necessarily true. if you have little credit history or if it's "new" credit it could.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Credit_score_%28United_States%29#Makeup_of_the_credit_score

otherwise having a large credit limit with no balance would lower your ratio of total used credit:total credit limit, which makes up nearly a third of your credit score. if that ratio goes over 30% then it starts to really hurt your score.

also you should use your credit account at least twice a year to keep it current. buying lunch on your credit card and paying the bill at the end of the month would work. otherwise the credit line will go stale on your report and the bank will probably end up closing the account anyway.

to add to the thread, you can get close FICO score approximations at www.quizzle.com and www.creditkarma.com . don't pay for any scores, especially the made up scores from credit agencies. the only score that matters is FICO and quizzle/creditkarma give close approximations for free.
also don't use any other site to get your credit report other than the site the OP posted (www.annualcreditreport.com). this is the federal mandated "free" site. any other "free" site, actually has a catch with it.

[robmpink]

Good short term fix but if they remove the negatives for the 30 day period it's just a matter of time before the creditors will report the same crap again. The only thing that fixes credit is time.

I didn't mean it in that way. I know what you mean Some agencies delete it while it is investigated. I meant I had bank loans from the same bank, maybe 5 of them over the last 5 years. I paid them all but were between 30-90 days late on all. I disputed all of them saying I was never late. On all loans it was corrected as never late. This was for all 3 agencies. To this day it shows never late. I bought my first house in Feb and may not have qualified for the loan without some of these corrections.

I agree with what you say, it takes time to repair your credit. However, you may get lucky in some disputes. It is worth a try if you have something big coming up (house/car) and you have no other hope. I saw this post last year and did it. I had no intention of getting a house, but I did and this helped.

[robmpink]

Also myfico.com is a good forum as well to check out.

[CashMoney]

I didn't mean it in that way. I know what you mean Some agencies delete it while it is investigated. I meant I had bank loans from the same bank, maybe 5 of them over the last 5 years. I paid them all but were between 30-90 days late on all. I disputed all of them saying I was never late. On all loans it was corrected as never late. This was for all 3 agencies. To this day it shows never late. I bought my first house in Feb and may not have qualified for the loan without some of these corrections.

I agree with what you say, it takes time to repair your credit. However, you may get lucky in some disputes. It is worth a try if you have something big coming up (house/car) and you have no other hope. I saw this post last year and did it. I had no intention of getting a house, but I did and this helped.

[robmpink]

It worked out but I'm the loser for not caring when I was younger. I didn't declare bankrupcy or anything like that, just late sometimes and a cc chargeoff or two. All paid.

[losturmarbles]

Good short term fix but if they remove the negatives for the 30 day period it's just a matter of time before the creditors will report the same crap again. The only thing that fixes credit is time.

the problem comes in that all the credit agencies do to verify the dispute is ask the bank, "is this charge valid?" or "is this info correct?" and then the bank responds "yes" 100% of the time regardless if it actually is. and that's the end. dispute denied.

what picantel and robmpink is suggesting that you make your dispute at the beginning of december, so that the banks will probably not be able to confirm the disputed info over the holidays within 30 days.

if they fail to respond within 30 days then the credit agency is required to take it off your report.
i'm pretty sure you have to do this with all 3 agencies and not just one. so that's 3 different disputes.

if you have an outstanding debt, the bank can't report the same info again, but it most likely was sold to a collector. the collector has to contact you, usually by phone and then (by law) a letter. and if you fail to respond within 30 days, then they will report it to the credit agencies. if you do respond asking for proof of the debt, etc, many times the collector will sell your debt to another agency and the process repeats itself.
this could go on until well after the debt is out of SOL (statute of limitation).
or if the debt is valid, you could work out an agreement with the collector to settle the debt. just make sure you get it in writing from the collector that nothing negative goes on your credit report.

if the debt is not valid or if it's out of SOL, protect yourself by knowing the law.

http://www.fair-debt-collection.com/disputing-debt-collections.html

http://www.fair-debt-collection.com/SOL-by-State.html

[ucbearcats1027]