How to Repair Your Credit

A selected, short excerpt from Chapter 12 of The Secrets About Good Credit and Debt Reduction

Many American consumers have "bad credit" for various reasons. A large percentage of these consumers have experienced financial difficulty because of divorce, unemployment, illness, or a failed business. A smaller percentage is due to irresponsibility or a lack of knowledge. Credit problems last much longer than the situations that caused the credit problems....Your bad credit rating stays with you, unless you do something about it. Your credit rating is not something you think about until there is a need for credit or you have been denied credit.

Start the process of repairing your credit rating before you apply for credit. If you have a bad credit rating, it is absolutely essential that you re-establish a good rating. It is easier to re-establish your credit while you still have open accounts that you are currently paying. perhaps you have been late or past due, skipped payments, or stopped payments, and although you have the account you can't use it. If possible, bring the account current and start to change your behavior today by paying your bills on time. if it is not possible to bring the account current at once, set up a payment plan with the creditor and make the payment on time until the account is paid in full. You can't change the past but you can change the future.

The first step to repairing your credit rating is to get copies of your credit report from each of the three major credit bureaus....After receiving your reports, prepare to start working with the credit bureaus and the creditors that report to the bureaus. Here's how to get started:

• Read and interpret each report from each bureau...

• Start making notes of inaccurate or old information.

• Send a letter to each of the three credit bureaus. Each letter should address the inaccuracies being reported on your credit report.

• Keep copies of everything you send and send the letters registered mail with return receipt requested.

• Wait for the credit bureaus to respond. If you haven't heard from them within thirty days, send a follow-up letter.

• Once you have received updated reports, compare the old ones to the new ones. Review the credit reports individually. They are not the same. You are correcting your credit report with three different credit bureaus.

• If you are not satisfied with the accuracy of your reports, repeat the process until you are.

The Secrets to Good Credit and Debt Reduction: A Consumer Self Help Guide contains more tips and instructions for repairing your credit. It also has sample letters you can copy and send to credit bureaus to request your report, notify the bureaus of inaccuracies in your report and more! Order your copy today!

The author, D.J. Williams, also writes and publishes a free, bimonthly newsletter full of tips, news and other information about consumer credit and money management.
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