Did
You Score Credit Today?
By: J Shipper
Keep Your Credit History Clean - Remove A Negative
Credit Record From Your Credit Report
It can make a difference of up to 18% in loan
repayment costs. For example, on a 30-year, $150,000
fixed rate mortgage, a borrower with the best credit
score, 760-850, will pay 5.59%, or $860 per month,
while someone in the worst score range will pay
7.18%, or $1,016 per month. This can make a big
different to the household budget, so it's to your
advantage to keep your credit score as low as
possible.
The 3 major credit bureaus, Experian, Equifax and
Trans Union are similar and feature a "Credit
Score", which is derived from credit report
information submitted to them about you.
Under the Equal Credit Opportunity Act, a credit
scoring system may not use characteristics such as
race, sex, marital status, national origin or
religion as factors, though they are allowed to use
age.
Credit scores are determined by your bill-paying
history, the number and type type of accounts you
have, late payments, collection actions, and
outstanding debt. The total number of points
reflects how likely you are, statistically-speaking,
to pay back a loan.
If you are denied credit, the Equal Credit
Opportunity Act forces the creditor to tell you the
specific reasons your loan application was denied if
you ask within 60 days. Acceptable reasons include
high balances on charge cards, or bad employment
history. Unacceptable reasons include vague excuses
such as "You didn't meet our minimum standards".
Sometimes you can be denied credit because of
information on a credit report. The Fair Credit
Reporting Act requires the creditor to give you the
contact information of the credit report agency
supplying the information. The credit reporting
agency can give you the information on your report,
but only the lender can tell you why this led to
your application being refused.
However your credit report may include inaccurate or
incomplete information (credit records). Identity
theft is a growing problem, and can take up to a
year to resolve. Nearly 10 million people fall
victim to identity theft each year, costing
consumers $5 billion and businesses $48 billion,
according to the Federal Trade Commission.
In this situation you have to send letters to every
one of the credit bureaus. Also learn your credit
rights by familiarizing yourself with the Fair
Credit Reporting Act (FRCA).
The FCRA gives you the right to dispute inaccuracies
and omissions, and it requires credit bureaus to
investigate your complaint (generally in thirty
days), send you a prompt response and correct any
errors. The law as well requires the source of
inaccurate information (such as a bank) to correct
the record at the credit bureaus to which it
initially provided the erroneous information.
Consumers working on their credit reports say many
times their letters are ignored by credit bureaus.
Consumers say even with proof a credit record isn't
theirs, its removal from their credit report can
take 3 or even 4 challenge letters, because the
credit bureaus will have only corrected the facts in
their own files and not updated the credit report.
Send your dispute letter by REGISTED MAIL. Credit
companies will respond faster if they know you can
prove you filed a complaint on a certain date. Keep
a record of when you sent the dispute letters and
what date you should expect a response. If you have
received no defense to your claim after thirty to
thirty seven days, send another registered letter
requesting an updated credit report and demanding
the disputed credit record be deleted.
If the bureaus don't reply in the thirty days, it
must be that the information they had on file was
either inaccurate or unverifiable. In either case,
based on data from the Fair Credit Reporting Act,
the credit record must be immediately deleted from
your credit report.
A few consumers have eliminated negative marks on
credit reports just by going through this process of
disputing credit records many times. Since some
creditors will not take the time to respond, you can
sometimes win by default. Usually a bit of progress
will be made with each challenge.Remember, the
credit bureau would like you to quit bothering them
because if you are not disputing the credit report,
they can legally carry on selling it as profitable
information.
Author Bio
J Shipper is interested in credit
www.credit-score-now.info
www.bankruptcy-credit-cards-debthelpnet.info
www.credit-cards-2006.info
Article Source:
http://www.ArticleGeek.com - Free Website
Content |
|
