Credit Report Dispute
How you can dispute your credit report and remove bad credit.
In order to remove derogatory items from your credit report you have to dispute the credit bureaus. There are two options to do this.
1. Create a dispute letter
This option will require you to write a dispute letter. In this letter you will need to identify the negative mark and provide and explanation as to why it is inaccurate.
Reasons often include; not my account,
amount is wrong, item is out of date and etcetera. You must send this letter to each credit bureau.
2. Hire a professional credit repair firm.
With this option the company will write the dispute letter for you and mail it to the credit bureaus. The advantage of a company is they have advanced dispute techniques such as; escalated dispute information requests, debt validation, and creditor direct intervention.
I would suggest hiring a company if you have multiple negative listings on your credit history. However if you only have one or two negative listings you can remove them yourself.
When the credit bureaus receive your dispute letter and deem it a valid dispute then they will conduct an investigation. If the listing can not be verified then it must be removed from you credit report.
Be aware that it is common for bureaus to use stall tactics to avoid conducting investigations. This is because it costs the credit bureaus potential profits to conduct an investigation.
However the Fair Credit Reporting Act states that the bureaus must investigate disputes and if found unverifiable the listing must be removed. The hard part is getting the bureaus to deem you dispute letter valid.
If you have trouble I suggest a credit repair firm, however if you are persistent then the bureaus will eventually deem your dispute valid and conduct an investigation.
Frequently an investigation will result in a bad credit item being removed. This happens because many lenders are not willing to spend the resources to verify debts.
Which ever method you choose negative credit can be removed from your credit report. You do not have to wait the full seven years.
