
Okay, so you have discovered that you have bad credit and now you are determined to improve it. There are many things you can do to regain a good credit standing. Nevertheless, you may not know that some steps could be doing more damage than good to your credit.
Take a look at the following credit repair mistakes to avoid.
1. Disputing too many items at once.
If there are errors or unauthorized charges in your credit report, you can actually request for correction by sending a dispute letter to the bureau that issued your report. However, in case you find several errors in different accounts, you should not try to dispute all these items all at the same time. Why?
First, the bureau may not take your dispute seriously. Second, the bureau may conduct an investigation on just one account. To make sure that all errors would be corrected, you must send dispute each error one at a time.
2. Getting help from the wrong debt relief organization.
There are many credit repair agencies offering help to people with bad credit. Of course, not all of them can be trusted. Some agencies may not sincerely care about resolving your problem and are only after making profit. Some could even take advantage of your situation by charging hidden fees or unreasonable service charge. To be sure, check the background and reputation of the credit counseling agency.
3. Closing credit card accounts.
Closing out an account is not always the solution and must be done with great care. For instance, if you cancel a credit card with an existing balance, you will be inflicting more damage to your credit. Furthermore, if you have that credit card for a long time, closing it out could mean deleting a significant part of your credit history as well.
4. Consolidating credit card debt with another credit card.
Some financial consultants may recommend getting a new credit card with zero balance transfer rate to consolidate your debts. While this can be a smart strategy, it should be done with caution.
First, you need to make sure that your new credit card doesn’t come with unreasonable fees and that the regular interest rate would still be reasonable after the introductory period. Second, you need to complete your pay down all your transferred balances before the zero rate period expires.
5. Not using registered mail in sending letters.
Whenever you want to send a letter to a creditor or to the credit bureaus, you should always send it via First Class Mailing. This way, you can be assured that your letter will reach the intended recipient and you will have proof as well.
