Personal Finance
CREDIT REPORTS
Credit Repair When Creditors Err
Eliot Wagonheim: The whole purpose of the Credit Report is to place other people on notice as to whether somebody is or is not honoring their obligations.
Steve Lovejoy: What you'll see on there is what creditors, you owe money to or did owe money to, whether you paid as agreed and if you were delinquent at all when you were delinquent. If you want to access your Credit Report, you can do so for free.
Peter Holland: There is a website called annualcreditreport.com. That's a government sponsored website, it's free. Pull your Credit Report at least once a year and review it for accuracy.
Steve Lovejoy: Seldom have I seen a clean Credit Report that doesn't have a few errors in it.
Peter Holland: Make sure that the accounts listed on there are in fact your accounts. Make sure that if you paid off an account in full it reflects that it was paid off.
Steve Lovejoy: If there is an error you should be able to get it fixed pretty quickly.
Peter Holland: You've got to write letters to the Credit Reporting agencies such as Equifax, Experian or Trans Union.
Steve Lovejoy: And you say, here's the error. They have 30 days to investigate whether you are correct or not.
Peter Holland: They can take off what's inaccurate or false or wrong.
Steve Lovejoy: You can't challenge legitimate, truthful information that's on there.
Eliot Wagonheim: You as the Debtor do not have the right to force somebody to under-report that.
Peter Holland: If you would simply have paid off your debts, they are going to stay on there for a period of time.
Eliot Wagonheim: You can write an explanation, which the credit agencies have to attach to your credit reports. So anybody pulling your Credit Report not only sees that negative entry but sees your explanation of it.
The best way to repair a credit that you've earned up to now is to start today to honor the obligations and to build a credit record so that years down the road the only thing reflected on there is that your credit is clean as a whistle.
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