Does Your Credit Report Contain Errors?

If it does then it can cost your thousands of dollars.

In today's world,  your credit rating is important. A positive credit rating is essential for  purchasing a home, buying or renting an automobile, obtaining credit cards, to obtain insurance and  some employers even ask permission to review job candidates' credit reports.

Public Interest Research Group or PIRG conducted a study in 1998 and found that 70% of credit reports contained errors and that 29% of the errors  were serious enough to potentially cause denial of credit.

Inaccurate credit reports may be costing you thousands of dollars. Here are some examples:

Automobile Financing - It you are buying a car and have bad credit it can be costing you $5,000 to $9,000 more just for having bad credit. These cost shows up in higher interest cost and a  higher monthly payment. Let’s look what a difference it makes

Home Mortgage The cost is bad enough on an automobile, but it is dramatically higher when it is a home mortgage. To purchase a $100,000 home it can cost as much as $50,000 to $130,000 over the life of the loan.  Let’s take a look.

Insurance The insurance companies use your credit reports to determine the premiums you pay. In short worst your credit is the more you have to pay.  You can save hundreds or even thousands of dollars, by correcting the errors in your credit report.

Credit Cards It can be very difficult to obtained a credit card without giving the creditor collateral, often in a cash deposit, to secure the debt..  If you can obtain credit then it will require initial set up fees, account fees and higher interest which in return cost you hundreds of dollars more in interest each year.

Some of the things which may be causing you problems:

     Inaccurate or Obsolete information is being reported on your report.

     Identity Theft - A major and growing problem where an individual obtains your     credit information and obtains credit under your name. Often an ex spouse or roommate.

     Merged Credit File - Another persons credit has been merged into your file.

     Excessive Pulls of your credit report by creditors and others.

     Insufficent Credit History - Your creditors have failed to report your good credit. This has become more common as some creditors attempt to keep customers and to prevent customers from becoming over extended.

How we can help?

We can help you to remove inaccurate and obsolete information from your credit report by using various consumer protections laws.  We cannot remove accurate information but often a settlement can be made with a creditor in which they will voluntarily remove an adverse item.  In certain cases where the creditor and/or the does not remove inaccurate or obsolete information you are entitled to recover damages against the creditor and/or the credit reporting agency.

Unauthorized Use.

Similarly, companies and individuals, including ex-spouses and attorneys, may obtain a consumer report for  unauthorized purposes. The federal Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) limits the permissible purposes for which a  consumer report may be requested by court ordered access, access on written  approval by the consumer, extension of credit, application for insurance or for government license or permit, or other business purposes. A collection agency  may access the consumer report in the course of collecting a debt. Examples of obtaining consumer reports for unauthorized purposes include: accessing the  report for the purpose of litigation, accessing the report of a political rival,  accessing the consumer report for use in support proceedings prior to the entry of judgment without court order, etc.

Deletion of Improper Information.

The FCRA requires the credit reporting agencies to maintain consumer reports to reflect the maximum possible accuracy. Debts older than seven (7)  years and bankruptcies older than (10) years are required to be deleted. The  consumer may request the credit reporting agency to reinvestigate. If the entry  is not verified or the creditor does not respond, the information must be removed. The failure of the credit reporting agency to delete obsolete or unverified information violates the FCRA. Also, the reappearance of such information after removal is likely to violate the Act.

Decline of Credit

If a creditor declines credit to you based on your credit history they are required to let you know the name and address of the reporting agency. If they fail to do so you can recover damages.

We welcome the opportunity to assist our client  to insure that the credit reporting agencies maintain accurate credit information which saves them thousands of dollars.