How Do You Fix Credit Report Errors?

You have seen the ads in the newspaper and read the signs nailed to telephone poles: “Credit problems? We erase bad debt.” Sound easy, huh? Just call the number and pay a fee, and your credit woes will disappear.

Bad credit does not vanish by paying someone to remove it. There are legitimate credit repair organizations to help remove inaccurate information from credit reports.
The first step in fixing credit report errors is to identify what’s wrong by getting a copy of your own credit report. (everyone is entitled to one free report per year from each of the credit bureas: Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion. Then review it for its accuracy.

• There should be no late pays on it! 35% of your credit score is based on timely payments.
• There should be no any collections or charge-offs more than 7 years old.
• Best to keep balances on available credit under 50% of the available limit, 30% is even better. Debt accounts for 30% of your score.
• Length of credit accounts for 15% of a credit score so check the original dates.

Think twice before closing that credit card which will shrink the available credit listings on your report and hurts the credit utilization ratio.

Good credit is key to just about everything today, including getting home owner’s insurance as well as buying anything you want with credit. Credit scores need to be at least a good 680 or higher. Maybe removing any little ding and any mistake made on your credit scoring would be worth the effort.