One of the most famous credit repair law firms is Lexington Law. Probably the next most famous one is Ovation Law. There are many others. I am completely for people utilizing legitimate credit repair companies, but I really take issue with ones like these that have monthly charges. Also, though they may have started out as really good companies, they have just become big repair mills that don't personalize your disputes. Also, they are not really "law firms" in the sense that they actually provide "legal services" other than credit repair. They mostly are credit repair companies that pay to use a law firm's or lawyer's name.
When you pay for a service that charges you monthly, you can bet they are going to do things that drag it out so they can keep getting that residual monthly income coming from you. Most people want to see their credit improved as quickly as possible. They don't want the service to write letters in a way that gets a "frivolous letter" response from the bureaus. That can delay progress for months and sometimes, it really blows the opportunity of getting that item removed at all.
There is another thing I really don't like about these types of law firms. They use "Good Will" letters to try to improve the credit. Why don't I like those? Well, they are basically "Pay for Delete" letters and I am adamantly opposed to paying to delete bad credit. Sometimes they delete, but many times, when they don't and you follow up to the bureaus and send in a copy of the agreement to delete, they get stubborn and refuse to take it off. Sending in a copy of an agreement is like admitting that the negative tradeline is yours. I don't ever recommending sending proof of an account to the bureaus unless it is a completely clean bit of proof that there were no lates and it was paid off completely. You have to remember that the burden of proof lies with the creditors, collectors, and the bureaus. If they can't prove something, it has to come off.
Something else I don't like about these "Good Will" and "Pay for Delete" letters, is that you are basically offering to settle with the creditors and collectors. This is so bad! Once a trade line is bad, it is always bad. It just becomes a "paid" bad. If its a couple late pays that are making it bad, its best to try to remove the lates, then there's nothing bad. You have to remove the "bad". Usually this means needing a deletion. Plus, when you "settle" with one of these types of letters, they have the right to send you a 1099 tax form for the amount you didn't have to pay and then you get to pay taxes on that as if it was income. Not a good thing.
The other thing that I know they do, is to include a "Cease and Desist" to their clients' creditors. That is a very dangerous thing to do. If it is not a time barred debt (outside of your state's statute of limitations) you are allowing yourself to be put in a position to be sued. I use a "Limited Cease and Desist" paragraph in my letters. This is what stops the phone calls to you at home, your cell phone, your work, and anyone you might possibly know that they would try to call. It forces them to communicate with you in writing only.
I have a lot of second hand experience with these types of credit repair companies. Second hand because many of my clients, past and present, have used them and came to me afterwards. It is always the same story. They've paid for months and months, past a year, spent upwards of $1500 and slim to zero results. They then have me write letters for them and poof!, all of a sudden they start seeing results. Credit repair is most successful when it is strategically done and both the creditors/collectors and the bureaus have consumer laws, case laws, and other legal documentation put in front of their faces.
My goal with credit repair is to help people see deletions and improvements as fast as possible. There is no sense in dragging it out. If you truly want to help people, then you would want what's best for them. If you are only interested in making a load of money off of people's bad credit, then you charge them up front and drag it out, month after month, year after year.
Credit repair can be done for yourself. Hopefully, if you're looking to do this, you will look through the different posts I have here so you can see how to do it most effectively. Credit repair is an undertaking that you have to stay on top of, be consistent, keep records and send disputes that fall within the legal timelines so that you don't accidentally give the bureaus more time to stall and drag their side out as well. For many people, its just a lot of work they would rather delegate to someone else to do.
If credit repair is something you need, but you just don't want to have to be writing letters all the time, I would love to help you. I provide help completely legally and use many different laws and tools to implore them to remove the bad credit from your reports. Contact me through my email or phone number above anytime if you would like some help with repairing your credit or just need some guidance while you do it yourself.
Showing posts with label credit laws. Show all posts
Showing posts with label credit laws. Show all posts
Monday, February 18, 2013
Saturday, July 31, 2010
If The Credit Bureau Verifies Your Bad Credit Dispute
If you've been working on repairing your credit, it is highly likely that when you get your reports back from the credit bureaus, you will see, or have seen, that they have verified one or several of the disputed negative items. This is actually a common occurrence in the process. There is a simple explanation for this, though, it's not a delightful reason.
When you make your dispute, you may explain in detail why the item should be removed from your credit report. The FCRA demands that the bureaus verify the accuracy of what you are disputing with the provider of that information. However, they don't call them or send a copy of your letter, or even electronically question the provider with the same specifics that you presented in your dispute. Instead, they electronically reduce your dispute down to a general 2 digit code that represents the "category" of your dispute. There are no details included, just the code.
So, they send this code electronically to the provider of the information, who then has to reply to the bureaus with a code back agreeing that the information was not accurate or they use a code to say, "yep, we verify that our information is correct". The credit bureaus have 30 days to get back to you to inform you of the results of their "investigation". Doesn't really sound like an investigation though, does it?
Now, you have rights under the FCRA to demand from them proof of the investigation and their method of verification. You can request the name of the person they spoke to, their title, and their contact information. What they will then send you is a basic form letter saying that they electronically verified, and that's all they are going to do for you. So, you will have to demand again that they provide the method of verification, but this time, you must do it correctly. Better yet, do it right the first time, when they send the form letter, send the demand again with an intent to sue letter.
You are probably wondering how to do this the right way. The way I do it is, I include the definition of verification from Black's Law dictionary in the letter. I include the law from the FCRA that gives me the right to receive their method of verification. I also include case law for each of the bureaus that the courts shot them down for verification that does not meet the standards of the FCRA. I also include an intent to sue for willful non-compliance with the FCRA.
If you have contacted the original creditor regarding the account you are disputing, get the contact name and information of the person that you talked to. If they do not have the information, ask them to put it in writing and send it to you. Once they have sold it to a collection company, 99% of the time, they do not have the information on the alleged account.
Send a copy of this letter to the bureaus along with your demand for method of validation and intent to sue letters. They are not going to contact them because they don't have time for that. Most likely, at this point, they will remove the negative credit from your report. If not, you should follow through with either a complaint to the attorney general of your state, the better business bureau, and/or sue them in small claims court. You could actually, if the damages add up enough, sue them in Federal Court, because the FCRA is a federal law and they violated it!
One more thing, just because they reduce your dispute down to a 2 digit code, don't skimp on your dispute. This is going to be proof that they have not even attempted to verify your dispute accurately. Usually the code they use is so general and it does not come close to expressing the information you gave them. This can be used against them.
When you make your dispute, you may explain in detail why the item should be removed from your credit report. The FCRA demands that the bureaus verify the accuracy of what you are disputing with the provider of that information. However, they don't call them or send a copy of your letter, or even electronically question the provider with the same specifics that you presented in your dispute. Instead, they electronically reduce your dispute down to a general 2 digit code that represents the "category" of your dispute. There are no details included, just the code.
So, they send this code electronically to the provider of the information, who then has to reply to the bureaus with a code back agreeing that the information was not accurate or they use a code to say, "yep, we verify that our information is correct". The credit bureaus have 30 days to get back to you to inform you of the results of their "investigation". Doesn't really sound like an investigation though, does it?
Now, you have rights under the FCRA to demand from them proof of the investigation and their method of verification. You can request the name of the person they spoke to, their title, and their contact information. What they will then send you is a basic form letter saying that they electronically verified, and that's all they are going to do for you. So, you will have to demand again that they provide the method of verification, but this time, you must do it correctly. Better yet, do it right the first time, when they send the form letter, send the demand again with an intent to sue letter.
You are probably wondering how to do this the right way. The way I do it is, I include the definition of verification from Black's Law dictionary in the letter. I include the law from the FCRA that gives me the right to receive their method of verification. I also include case law for each of the bureaus that the courts shot them down for verification that does not meet the standards of the FCRA. I also include an intent to sue for willful non-compliance with the FCRA.
If you have contacted the original creditor regarding the account you are disputing, get the contact name and information of the person that you talked to. If they do not have the information, ask them to put it in writing and send it to you. Once they have sold it to a collection company, 99% of the time, they do not have the information on the alleged account.
Send a copy of this letter to the bureaus along with your demand for method of validation and intent to sue letters. They are not going to contact them because they don't have time for that. Most likely, at this point, they will remove the negative credit from your report. If not, you should follow through with either a complaint to the attorney general of your state, the better business bureau, and/or sue them in small claims court. You could actually, if the damages add up enough, sue them in Federal Court, because the FCRA is a federal law and they violated it!
One more thing, just because they reduce your dispute down to a 2 digit code, don't skimp on your dispute. This is going to be proof that they have not even attempted to verify your dispute accurately. Usually the code they use is so general and it does not come close to expressing the information you gave them. This can be used against them.
Thursday, December 18, 2008
Myths and Bad Advice Regarding Credit Repair - Part 1
I like to read a lot. It usually starts out with doing a little research and then I end up spending hours and hours just reading articles, one after the other, all because I read something that just bugs me. I try to find more articles by different people spewing the same nonsense. It gets me in the writing mode.
So today, I was watching some videos and reading articles relating to credit repair and I have to tell you, boy, if you don't know the real truths about what they're saying, you're gonna believe your credit is going to suck for years and years. It simply is not so!
Let's start off with why there is so much bad information being put out there. There have always been people with bad credit. There have always been people who wanted to clean up their credit without waiting 7 - 10 years for stuff to "fall off". Many years ago, the courts made a ruling that not only can you work on cleaning up bad trade lines on your credit, they decided that one could use a third party to work on it for them. At this point, credit repair companies started emerging out of the woodwork.
Well, the credit bureaus knew that though many of the credit repair companies would be looking for a quick buck and attempt to do a mediocre job, there would be some that would study the laws and successfully be able to help repair their clients' credit. The bureaus are nationally traded companies. They are not government agencies. They store credit information and sell credit information to make big money. Bad credit is BIG BUCKS! Successfully removing bad credit from credit reports cuts into their Big Profits!
So, they set out on a huge, massive campaign to distort the truth and confuse consumers. Their plan was to make the consumer believe that once bad credit is on your report, you're stuck with it for 7 - 10 years. They have been mighty successful with this campaign. They write articles about credit reports too. They just don't tell the whole truth. They pick apart the truth and put in partial truths. They slant the information to hide the true facts about information reported on your credit report. They need to deter individuals from even contemplating the chore of fixing their credit to protect their profits.
Next, you have people who buy into the garbage the credit bureaus are trying to brainwash everyone with. They unknowingly (usually) further the campaign of the credit bureaus. You have people who write articles online. You also have online marketers that set up content websites to make money off of affiliate products and adsense. They use those articles and write articles of their own to put on the websites. The writers take the information the bureaus put out and just regurgitate it in their own words. After writing lots of articles, oh wow, they're an expert. NOT! But, they are "perceived" as experts. The problem is, they really didn't do thorough research. They took one-sided information and repeated it. Now multiply that by thousands of article writers and what do you get? Thousands and thousands of articles on lots and lots of websites, writing the same crap over and over again!
Not here! I actually like research. I actually have read the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA), the Fair Debt Collections Practices Act (FDCPA), the Fair Credit Billing Act (FCBA), the Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act (FACTA), (all of which are credit laws written to protect the consumer - not the credit bureaus), lots of case law and lots of information on state statutes.
So when I talk about credit repair and when I do credit repair, I know what I'm saying is the truth and I know what I'm doing for each client is legal. My truths come from the laws that were written to protect us, the consumers. My work for my clients is legally done and uses the laws to remove the bad credit.
In Part 2 of this topic, I will share some of the information that is put out there for you to believe. I will tell you if it is the truth, a partial truth or just utter BS. I will also tell you what the real truth is and back it up with the law or laws to prove it when applicable!
Stay tuned!
So today, I was watching some videos and reading articles relating to credit repair and I have to tell you, boy, if you don't know the real truths about what they're saying, you're gonna believe your credit is going to suck for years and years. It simply is not so!
Let's start off with why there is so much bad information being put out there. There have always been people with bad credit. There have always been people who wanted to clean up their credit without waiting 7 - 10 years for stuff to "fall off". Many years ago, the courts made a ruling that not only can you work on cleaning up bad trade lines on your credit, they decided that one could use a third party to work on it for them. At this point, credit repair companies started emerging out of the woodwork.
Well, the credit bureaus knew that though many of the credit repair companies would be looking for a quick buck and attempt to do a mediocre job, there would be some that would study the laws and successfully be able to help repair their clients' credit. The bureaus are nationally traded companies. They are not government agencies. They store credit information and sell credit information to make big money. Bad credit is BIG BUCKS! Successfully removing bad credit from credit reports cuts into their Big Profits!
So, they set out on a huge, massive campaign to distort the truth and confuse consumers. Their plan was to make the consumer believe that once bad credit is on your report, you're stuck with it for 7 - 10 years. They have been mighty successful with this campaign. They write articles about credit reports too. They just don't tell the whole truth. They pick apart the truth and put in partial truths. They slant the information to hide the true facts about information reported on your credit report. They need to deter individuals from even contemplating the chore of fixing their credit to protect their profits.
Next, you have people who buy into the garbage the credit bureaus are trying to brainwash everyone with. They unknowingly (usually) further the campaign of the credit bureaus. You have people who write articles online. You also have online marketers that set up content websites to make money off of affiliate products and adsense. They use those articles and write articles of their own to put on the websites. The writers take the information the bureaus put out and just regurgitate it in their own words. After writing lots of articles, oh wow, they're an expert. NOT! But, they are "perceived" as experts. The problem is, they really didn't do thorough research. They took one-sided information and repeated it. Now multiply that by thousands of article writers and what do you get? Thousands and thousands of articles on lots and lots of websites, writing the same crap over and over again!
Not here! I actually like research. I actually have read the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA), the Fair Debt Collections Practices Act (FDCPA), the Fair Credit Billing Act (FCBA), the Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act (FACTA), (all of which are credit laws written to protect the consumer - not the credit bureaus), lots of case law and lots of information on state statutes.
So when I talk about credit repair and when I do credit repair, I know what I'm saying is the truth and I know what I'm doing for each client is legal. My truths come from the laws that were written to protect us, the consumers. My work for my clients is legally done and uses the laws to remove the bad credit.
In Part 2 of this topic, I will share some of the information that is put out there for you to believe. I will tell you if it is the truth, a partial truth or just utter BS. I will also tell you what the real truth is and back it up with the law or laws to prove it when applicable!
Stay tuned!
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