| You can improve your credit score. You can hire one | | | | dispute every negative item on your credit report. A |
| of the credit repair companies to help you or you can | | | | reputable credit repair specialist will tell you that you |
| do it yourself. There are legal techniques and there are | | | | should only dispute negative information that is |
| illegal techniques. A reputable credit repair specialist will | | | | questionable, outdated, unverifiable or inaccurate in |
| only offer to help you do what you could do on your | | | | some other way. The credit bureaus have the right to |
| own if you had the time, patience and knowledge. | | | | simply ignore disputes which they believe are frivolous. |
| Just because someone calls himself a credit repair | | | | If you send them a letter disputing a large number of |
| specialist does not necessarily guarantee that he has a | | | | negative items and you have not been a victim of |
| long list of qualifications. If he is not very good at what | | | | credit fraud, then they may simply ignore your letter. |
| he does, then he probably will not stay in business very | | | | At least one credit repair specialist has been known to |
| long, but you may not want to be one of his few | | | | say that the credit bureaus will probably not bother to |
| customers. If you are thinking of hiring one of the many | | | | investigate disputes. The major credit bureaus have |
| credit repair companies to help you improve or monitor | | | | systems in place to investigate disputes and it is highly |
| your credit scores, check the company out first. Find | | | | unlikely that they will remove negative items without |
| out how long they have been in business and if they | | | | investigating. It is more likely that they would classify |
| can provide you with the names of satisfied | | | | the dispute as frivolous. If they do happen to remove |
| customers. | | | | negative which are accurate, the company which |
| Credit repair companies which make unbelievable | | | | originally supplied the information may simply report it |
| claims about how quickly they can improve your credit | | | | again. So, even if you are successful in the short term, |
| score may be suggesting something illegal or they may | | | | you may not be in the long run. Credit repair |
| simply be exaggerating. Any reputable credit repair | | | | companies which claim otherwise are not being |
| specialist knows that it takes time to improve credit | | | | completely honest. |
| scores. If there is inaccurate information on your credit | | | | Negotiating with creditors is a legal technique to |
| report, correcting this information will improve your | | | | remove negative comments from your credit report. |
| credit score, but this is not usually a "quick" process. | | | | You can do this on your own or you can get help |
| The Federal Trade Commission advises that | | | | from a credit repair specialist. Sometimes a plan of |
| consumers should beware of credit repair companies | | | | action is all that you need. Reputable credit repair |
| which claim to be able to improve your credit score in | | | | companies can provide you with a plan and many |
| a very short period of time. A couple of months is a | | | | offer other valuable services. Identity theft insurance |
| reasonable amount of time to expect to see any | | | | and credit monitoring services may not improve your |
| results. | | | | credit score, but they could protect you from fraud. |
| Some credit repair companies suggest that you | | | | |