Cleaning Up Credit
I am in the process of trying to clean up my and my wifes credit and have a couple of questions. If I am trying to pay off a credit card that has been closed and gone to collections should I deal with the collection agency or try and contact the original creditor? If I settle with the Collection agency, will it change what the original creditor has on my credit report? also what happens to the collection account if I am able to settle with the original creditor?
Thanks so much for your help
Troy
Usually if the account has gone to collections or a third-party collection agency, the original creditor, especially an institutional lender, will not speak with you regarding the debt. You should probably speak with the collection company because credit card companies rarely deal, they let the people they sold the right to collect to worry about that.
You will probably have to deal with the collection agency, but remember that your #1 priority is getting that bad report off your credit. Of course you want to pay it, and if at the end they can't guarantee you anything, OK. Pay it.
But, I would try VERY hard to get a written commitment from them that they will expunge any bad report from your record.
(I've never had to do this. I am repeating advice that I've heard from others, so I may not be correct in my vocabulary, but the principle is sound.)
Try asking them for a letter from the original creditor that the account was in error. Then, after you pay it off, send copies of that letter to the three credit bureau's and get it removed.
I hope someone out there will correct me if I'm wrong.
Hope this helps.
Ronnie
First, you must plan your credit clean up strategy. Options:
1. If you pay the full amount due to the ORIGINAL credit card company in one lump sum, immediately dispute the Credit card and collection agency information with all the credit bureaus. The collection agency information will be deleted, and the credit card information deleted or updated.
2. If you are making payments, pay the collection agency (ON TIME), and after the final payment is made dispute the information on all credit bureau’s.
Cleaning credit files is a slow process, but you must be persistent with the credit bureaus. If you want a respectable contact to discuss credit repair and their guaranteed services please PM us.
Eric & Rosa
[addsig]
Ok....
I wrote several letters out to lenders about the money I owe them. None replied. Does that mean that I should of sent them to their collection agencies? How do I find out who is their collection agency when they won't even tell me over the phone?
Call s the lenders directly. Besides it would save a stamp.