Understanding Credit Information And How It Effects Our Shopping Power

Posted by admin on October 12th, 2008 at 10:51am

The bank world is foreign to many consumers outside of the industry. While many people labor over their Myspace and Facebook profiles and rewrite resumes to best reflect their employment profile, their financial profiles go neglected. Usually, they don’t even think about what their financial situation looks like on paper, until they are denied a loan. You can obtain your credit information and free credit score report through www.AnnualCreditReport.com as part of the Fair Credit Reporting Act.

Sometimes, you may look at your free credit scores and credit information only to find it rife with errors. First, get your free credit scores online from Equifax, Experian and TransUnion at www.AnnualCreditReport.com, then print them out and highlight any negative information. Circle disputed records. Check the expiration dates of the records. Bankruptcy filing records should have expired 10 years after the first filing date, charge-offs should be gone within 7 years, collection records should expire within 7 years and 180 days after the last late payment, closed accounts should be removed in 7 years, foreclosure records last for 7 years, inquiries will remain on your credit report for 1-2 years but will not hurt your overall score, judgments/court decisions will remain for 7 years after the filing date, late payments of more than 30 days remain for 7 years, repossession records persist for 7 years and tax liens can remain indefinitely, if unpaid, or else 7 years from the paid date.

To file a dispute about your credit information, you can write a dispute letter to each of the three of the credit bureaus, which are Equifax, Experian and TransUnion. In your letter, put the date, your address and name, phone number and social security number. Just write “The following data is incorrect and should be updated,” then list each inaccuracy, explaining why it’s wrong and what it should be updated with. Attach a marked copy of your credit score report and include any communication, account records or statements that will help verify your version of the truth. By letter is the best way to dispute with Equifax and TransUnion, while Experian only allows online disputes. The credit bureaus then have 30 days to check and repair your credit information. Once they are done, they will write you a letter letting you know what was or was not updated. If you’re not satisfied with the letter, then you can try to resubmit with different documents or get in touch with the creditor to try and resolve.

Sometimes, having a look at your credit information is the only way to bring to light an identity theft if you are don’t use one of the identity theft products such as Life Lock who monitor your credit information for you and watch for any unusual activity. If you find unusual in your credit information that you have absolutely no explanation for, an unpaid loan, a new TV on credit etc. contact the 3 credit agencies asap and police for information on your next steps. Without any form of protection, checking your credit information is perhaps the only chance to avoid identity theft running out of control with your finances. It won’t prevent it from occurring it but at least it stops it.

To get more credit information, you can check out www.Credit.com. Here you can look up info on popular credit cards, like the Chevron credit card, learn how to plan to buy a house or a car, learn about overcoming challenges and poor credit scores, and get tools on planning for retirement. You can download money management worksheets and check out online finance calculators, as well as gain access to registered credit experts.

Tags: Bankruptcy, credit information, Credit Score, foreclosure, identity theft, your credit score

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