You have the right, under the Fair Credit Reporting Act, to dispute the completeness and accuracy of information in your credit file. When a credit reporting agency receives a dispute, it must reinvestigate and record the current status of the disputed items within a "reasonable period of time," unless it believes the dispute is "frivolous or irrelevant." If the credit reporting agency cannot verify a disputed item, it must delete it. If your report contains erroneous information, the credit reporting agency must correct it. If an item is incomplete, the credit reporting agency must complete it.

You can allowed a copy of your credit once a year from each credit bereau. Along with your credit report will be a dispute form.

If there is incorrect information on your credit report such as a payment that was reported late that should not have we will be able to correct the information within 3-5 days by going directly through the 3 major credit bureaus and get a rescore to reflect what your credit score should be.

If you are unable to spend the time to write the letters yourself then you might want to hire a credit repair company to do this for you. They will act on your behalf to write the necessary letters to the 3 credit bureaus. There are many companies to choose from these days and it might be in your best interest to consult with your Mortgage Broker as to which company will give you the best service.

Prior to applying for a mortgage fixing all credit report errors will optimize your chances of obtaing the best financing terms available.

If you find an error, the Fair Credit Reporting Act requires credit bureaus and organizations that provide information to them to correct the mistake. But you have to get the ball rolling by requesting an investigation.

Under The Fair Credit Reporting Act effective October 1, 1997, a credit reporting agency has 5 days from the date of receipt of a written investigation request to contact the appropriate credit grantor about investigation the complaint(s) and receive a reply back within 30 days of the original notification date. Within 5 business days after the completion of the investigation, the credit bureau (ie: Equifax,Transunion,Experian) must send a written report to the consumer with its findings with a copy of the revised report if there were nay changes made.

If a credit bureau can not verify that a disputed item is correct as reported, it must modify or remove it from the consumers' file. If the tradeline confirms a a later date that the information was indeed correct, the credit bureau will add the information back into the consumers' file. It will notify the consumer in writing as to the changes, within 5 days of the change.

DO NOT expect information to be deleted just because a collection account or debt has been paid. Derogatory items will remain on your report for 7 years. The 7 year clock on a derogatory item falling off your report does not start until the item has been satisfied.

The consumer must write a letter of dispute regarding the erroneous information reported by a specific credit reporting agency. The letter must reference;
Your full name
Address
Social Security number
The tradline
Account numbers
Brief statement of what is incorrect.
Copies of supporting documents (if any)
The letter MUST be sent by overnight mail, with return receipt requested. This verifies when the 30 day clock starts ticking.

When disputing questionable items in a credit report, always remember to dispute with all three major credit bureau agencies. When applying for a mortgage, all lenders look at items reported by all three credit bureaus.

Make sure to keep the "acknowledgment" letters that the bureaus send to you at about 2 weeks. There is a date they have officially acknowledged they received your letters in which the 30 days in the FCRA should start.

The credit bureaus are not government run agencies, but are for profit, multi billion dollar industries that make money off of selling your personal information. It is proven that they make more money off of you with bad credit, rather than good credit, so don't believe everything that they tell you in results you receive back. Make sure to spend time, in detail, looking at your results and ensuring things like the date of verification have the current date. 50% of Transunion's verified accounts have old verification dates, which means they never investigated that account, yet put verified as a result anyway.

If a creditor verifies a previously deleted item after the 30 day window, they can add it back on. A notice of this Reinsertion must be sent the consumer within 5 days.

The "30 day rule" is a credit repair myth and is not used by knowledgable credit repair companies or consumers. This 30 day rule only causes reinsertions if not used properly. If the bureau is forced to delete an item at day 31, then most likely most of those accounts will reappear later, with proper reinsertion notification.

The very next line in the FCRA states that if the creditor or credit bureau verifies an account late, or after the 30 day timeline, they can simply add it back on.

Your credit picture is very important and should be kept up the entire time. Do not wait until the last minute (I.E. you want to apply for a mortgage next month). Credit repair is a process and you should allow appropriate time to remove items from the bureaus

Credit reporting is an imperfect system and there are times when you're credit is tainted and it's not your fault. Equifax, Experian, and Transunion don't always report the same information.