No, not every credit repair company is going to be a scam, but when a company/salesperson claims that accurate information will be removed, it is time to be very leery of the company.
I think that you have to be really careful, just like anything else you must do the research and make sure that the company is valid and that they are not scamming people out of money and not doing what they are supposed to do. There are many resources that a consumer can use to investigate. So before you invest your money, invest your time and see what the company is all about.
Good post goodnatured. I agree with you. I think people should think of shopping for a repair comapany as they would a bank or car loan. There are alot of good and bad ones to sort through. With the internet being a great tool to aid in their search. Sometimes by just ggogling a company name you can get some low downs on the positives and negatives of a company. Lots of people get so stressed when in financial turmoil that they just reach out and grab the first hand offering to help them out. It isn't always the best. A little time in research can save a lot of aggravation.
A good place to begin your investigation of a company is the BBB. There you can see how many people have filed compaints against them and if those compaints were resolved or not. I guess if you really just don't have the time to do it yourself you could look for help from these kind of companies but to me, its kind of like paying someone to go fill up your gas tank. Why pay someone else to do what you can do yourself for free?
Some folks really get intimidated by collectors, I mean sometimes collectors can be down right ruthless in their attempts to get a buck from the consumer.
Educating yourself on the laws of fair debt collection and knowing your rights is the first step. Making a stand and dealing with a ruthless collector is another. It is good to have forums like these to come too and get advice. In the meantime, don't answer the phone and send out those cease and desist when appropriate to keep the wolves at bay until you get the information that you need.
excellent resources on the debt forum in their do it yourself section. :) :) :)
It is no wonder people get intimidated by CA's.. They are always doing things like going into peoples accounts..senting false summons and a million other things I have read on this site. The worst is calling family or the persons work . I hope someday they pass a law on that. Either way the best way to start is here getting educated.
Well......I've looked at alot of credit repair companies. They want such a HIGH 'fee' for "helping you out." i tried to go through one, not too long ago. I lost about $600.00 and found out my creditors weren't even getting paid.
If you are going to use these companies, you really need to do your homework first, you can search the bbb and other internet resources to find out what the companies reputation before you put your hard earned in someone else's pocket. You can always do it yourself with a little time invested in educating yourself and standing up to the creditors you can handle debt management on your own.
I still think self help is the best. Reread some of the post or google credit repair companies. I gaurentee tou will find more horror stories than success stories. It really isn't that hard to do by yourself if your dedicated and who has money to lose by taking chances. I know I sure don't.
Definitely not. I am not taking chances with my money. It is better if I have to face tough challenges by doing it myself but NO i wont give it to someone who will waste it and leave me in a deeper mess.
They are always doing things like going into peoples accounts..senting false summons and a million other things I have read on this site. The worst is calling family or the persons work . I hope someday they pass a law on that.
It's called the FDCPA, and it applies to 3rd parties (friends, family, etc...) and places of employment, and it bans the disclosure of collection account information (3rd parties, not spouses). If you are hoping to explicitly ban all calls to anyone except the debtor, that will never happen.
Well......I've looked at alot of credit repair companies. They want such a HIGH 'fee' for "helping you out." i tried to go through one, not too long ago. I lost about $600.00 and found out my creditors weren't even getting paid.
That's consolidation or settlement, not credit repair.
But boy does it ever sound like most of the credit repair companies I've heard of. High fees, not getting exactly what you paid for, you name it. I think the point to make here is that whether its consolidation, settlement, or repair, its something anyone can learn how to do on their own if they are willing to take the time to educate themselves about it.
From what I read from the previous posts, many people are actually going for repair companies which provide settlement or consolidation options. It is information that credit repair, debt settlement, debt consolidation are different things. You should first make your ideas clear to do a good research on scams. Any questions for clarification will be welcome to who knows better about the subject.
I've been using mycmone.com for awhile and have had no problems with them and there fee is a flat $9.95 per month for both of their programs. They've paid my creditors no problems and I can still use my credit cards. Its not a traditional credit repair company since they don't do settlements but they are pretty quick to respond to my emails and are very friendly.
Has your score raised at all, I am curious what all they are doing for you for such a low price, please share with us. It may be something that others want to use.
You ever hear those commercials on the radio that insist that most credit repair companies actually work for the creditor themselves. I heard that the other day and thought what bologna. How much do they pay them to sucker us in. An honest person trying to get some help and relief from annoying calls and late bills and they do this.
Thats bad news but thats cent percent true. That is why we people keep shouting repair your own credit. i am sure I am not working for a scam credit repair company.
I believe a person is much better repairing their own credit. I mean at least you know you can trust yourself. There are soo many fraudulent companies out there now that debt has become such a massive problem. The strong feeding off the weaker people. There is so much good info available to anyine who wants to repair their own credit. A stop here at this website is a good start and I am sure with the internet being such an expansive place there are other avenues one could try also.
Actually, I used a credit repair agency by the name of Scorite and they were able to get some things removed and helped me to raise my median score by 56 points! I definetely don't think all credit repair is a scam....
Was there a cost to the service Amy, if so how much please. What types of things did they have removed from your report? I have been looking at a few but don't have a whole lot of trust with all the scams out there it is so hard to figure out who is legit and who isn't. Any information that you have as a personal user for this service.
Hope you get some answers here good natured. I know how hard it is these days to trust any of these companies. I know they are not all fraud companies. I just feel people need to be careful when making a choice.
The way I see it these companies have to pay their bills and their staff somehow. This means that they are getting money from ppl like you and me to pay YOUR bills and THEIR bills. So, I see it like this: It will sure be easier if you go to the full service pump but, You will sure pay for it in the end. Your better off getting off your rump and doing it yourself.
I think one should have a complete knowledge of the credit repair company first and then go for it. I think we can always share our experiences with credit repair companies in this forum so that people here will come to know who is doing frauds and who all are genuine.
There are sure enough frauds out there, where there is a way to scam, there are people out there that will do it. People get desperate and look for a way out and unfortunately find themselves dealing with people that don't have their best intrest in mind.
You should always fully investigate the company before handing over your hard earned cashed to them. coming here is a good way to find out what is really going on with a company. This is a good place to be.
You are correct. This forum is a wonderful place to discuss about the credit repair companies and our experiences with such companies, so that others in the forum can be benefited.
It is actually nice to be able to help someone else. Having gone through times like these we all can feel for someone else who just began trying to get everything fixed.
You know what they say fireyone, experience is the best teacher, well even if we walk away from a bad experience with something learned it is not a total loss, we can then share the information and move on from there.
It is natural for us to get all stressed out when we hit these financial crisis, but what we take a way from it is invaluable. A kid won't touch a hot plate if they have been burned previously from it, so this is sometimes the way we learn.
I too think that even sharing bad experiences help us learn something. When anybody is hit by a financial crisis as goodnatured pointed out and he shares his situation with the forum, not only does he gets help of how to get out of the situation, but also others can gain knowledge of how to get out of the situation if faced with similar crisis. I myself have benefited by learning a lot from this forum
I have personally used lexington law and it is not a scam. My score raised about 40 points in six months. However i stopped using them when equifax sent me one of their letters claiming that they cannot verify information for a third party. Meaning it had to come directly from me. And when i looked at what they wrote it was as a 10 year old wrote the verification letter. Nothing fancy and nothing Lawyerly about it. So i decided instead of paying 60/month why not just do it myself. Which I did and I got better results. So my advice is that although they are not scams you can do probably a better job doing it yourself.
There are many Credit Repair Companies that are not a scam, but you have got to be careful. Make sure that they only bill you when work is completed and that they don't guarantee that they will clean up your reports, because you can't guarantee that. A good alternative is a guarantee where you don't pay for their service unless they are successful in improving your credit reports.
If you are looking for a Credit Repair Company, do yourself a favor and first look for a Credit Repair Guide and/or Credit Repair Analysis on the internet and if you get a good response you can move forward.
True, always do your homework before investing your money. You can learn about credit repair and do it yourself, you end up with a good education on credit this way also.
You are right goodnatured. Although it is true that all credit repair companies are not scams, yet going for a credit repair companies will extract dollars out of you. Instead of spending dollars to repair credit, we can use these dollars to repay our debts. I think there are many pages in the creditmagic forum itself which gives us an idea of how to repair our own credit by just keeping track of our credit reports.
I know, we should work on a page that talks about credit repair, maybe we could all contribute to it and come up with a guide some how. I could use it myself. Is this something that you want to work on?
I agree with Justin. The money spent on credit repair would help paying off other bills. Most of what they do people could do theirselves. There is actually things you have to do yourself anyway like verifying. I would like to see a site on the repair process.
Yes, some of the steps that we can take to repair our own credit may include:
1) keeping track of our credit report on a regular basis
2) notifying any discrepancies in the credit report immediately to the credit reporting agencies
3) sending a DV letter to the CAs if you find any listing that do not match with our record. Or you may even send a DV letter to validate your debt, and try to make the creditor agree for PFD.
4) Asking the creditor to delete any unauthorized hard inquiry if you find any in your credit report.
I have gone through debt consolidation before, and everything worked out like I asked it would. My credit is better, and the fees were def. worth the experience.
I agree that it depends on the conditions and which company you choose. I chose a solid company, that I reviewed online for several weeks. Worked out perfectly!
Good thing to do JP. Never trust a company you haven't researched. A good place to start that research is BBB (better business Bureau). You can see complaints that have been filed and how they are rated. You amy also find ones that may help you by looking at hrier mreviews.
That is also a really good avenue to take as good natured suggests. You could post it as a quaestion and see if anyone else did any business with whom your are considering.
No, not every credit repair company is going to be a scam, but when a company/salesperson claims that accurate information will be removed, it is time to be very leery of the company.
I think that you have to be really careful, just like anything else you must do the research and make sure that the company is valid and that they are not scamming people out of money and not doing what they are supposed to do. There are many resources that a consumer can use to investigate. So before you invest your money, invest your time and see what the company is all about.
Good post goodnatured. I agree with you. I think people should think of shopping for a repair comapany as they would a bank or car loan. There are alot of good and bad ones to sort through. With the internet being a great tool to aid in their search. Sometimes by just ggogling a company name you can get some low downs on the positives and negatives of a company. Lots of people get so stressed when in financial turmoil that they just reach out and grab the first hand offering to help them out. It isn't always the best. A little time in research can save a lot of aggravation.
A good place to begin your investigation of a company is the BBB. There you can see how many people have filed compaints against them and if those compaints were resolved or not. I guess if you really just don't have the time to do it yourself you could look for help from these kind of companies but to me, its kind of like paying someone to go fill up your gas tank. Why pay someone else to do what you can do yourself for free?
great point cbass1017,
Some folks really get intimidated by collectors, I mean sometimes collectors can be down right ruthless in their attempts to get a buck from the consumer.
Educating yourself on the laws of fair debt collection and knowing your rights is the first step. Making a stand and dealing with a ruthless collector is another. It is good to have forums like these to come too and get advice. In the meantime, don't answer the phone and send out those cease and desist when appropriate to keep the wolves at bay until you get the information that you need.
excellent resources on the debt forum in their do it yourself section. :) :) :)
It is no wonder people get intimidated by CA's.. They are always doing things like going into peoples accounts..senting false summons and a million other things I have read on this site. The worst is calling family or the persons work . I hope someday they pass a law on that. Either way the best way to start is here getting educated.
You got that right fireyone, knowledge is power, educate yourself so that no one can take advantage of you.
Do you think credit repair companies are always a scam?
Well......I've looked at alot of credit repair companies. They want such a HIGH 'fee' for "helping you out." i tried to go through one, not too long ago. I lost about $600.00 and found out my creditors weren't even getting paid.
If you are going to use these companies, you really need to do your homework first, you can search the bbb and other internet resources to find out what the companies reputation before you put your hard earned in someone else's pocket. You can always do it yourself with a little time invested in educating yourself and standing up to the creditors you can handle debt management on your own.
I still think self help is the best. Reread some of the post or google credit repair companies. I gaurentee tou will find more horror stories than success stories. It really isn't that hard to do by yourself if your dedicated and who has money to lose by taking chances. I know I sure don't.
Definitely not. I am not taking chances with my money. It is better if I have to face tough challenges by doing it myself but NO i wont give it to someone who will waste it and leave me in a deeper mess.
I think if you educate yourself that you can do it yourself and save alot of money. and you know what is going on through out the whole process.
They are always doing things like going into peoples accounts..senting false summons and a million other things I have read on this site. The worst is calling family or the persons work . I hope someday they pass a law on that.
It's called the FDCPA, and it applies to 3rd parties (friends, family, etc...) and places of employment, and it bans the disclosure of collection account information (3rd parties, not spouses). If you are hoping to explicitly ban all calls to anyone except the debtor, that will never happen.
Well......I've looked at alot of credit repair companies. They want such a HIGH 'fee' for "helping you out." i tried to go through one, not too long ago. I lost about $600.00 and found out my creditors weren't even getting paid.
That's consolidation or settlement, not credit repair.
But boy does it ever sound like most of the credit repair companies I've heard of. High fees, not getting exactly what you paid for, you name it. I think the point to make here is that whether its consolidation, settlement, or repair, its something anyone can learn how to do on their own if they are willing to take the time to educate themselves about it.
From what I read from the previous posts, many people are actually going for repair companies which provide settlement or consolidation options. It is information that credit repair, debt settlement, debt consolidation are different things. You should first make your ideas clear to do a good research on scams. Any questions for clarification will be welcome to who knows better about the subject.
Company I use for credit repair
I've been using mycmone.com for awhile and have had no problems with them and there fee is a flat $9.95 per month for both of their programs. They've paid my creditors no problems and I can still use my credit cards. Its not a traditional credit repair company since they don't do settlements but they are pretty quick to respond to my emails and are very friendly.
Has your score raised at all, I am curious what all they are doing for you for such a low price, please share with us. It may be something that others want to use.
That is very true. Any advise will be helpful.
I just have never heard of a company that would do such a great deed for such a little price. I would be very interested in knowing more.
You ever hear those commercials on the radio that insist that most credit repair companies actually work for the creditor themselves. I heard that the other day and thought what bologna. How much do they pay them to sucker us in. An honest person trying to get some help and relief from annoying calls and late bills and they do this.
Thats bad news but thats cent percent true. That is why we people keep shouting repair your own credit. i am sure I am not working for a scam credit repair company.
I believe a person is much better repairing their own credit. I mean at least you know you can trust yourself. There are soo many fraudulent companies out there now that debt has become such a massive problem. The strong feeding off the weaker people. There is so much good info available to anyine who wants to repair their own credit. A stop here at this website is a good start and I am sure with the internet being such an expansive place there are other avenues one could try also.
knowledge is the best defense, the more you know about the more you can do on your own.
Credit Repair
Actually, I used a credit repair agency by the name of Scorite and they were able to get some things removed and helped me to raise my median score by 56 points! I definetely don't think all credit repair is a scam....
Was there a cost to the service Amy, if so how much please. What types of things did they have removed from your report? I have been looking at a few but don't have a whole lot of trust with all the scams out there it is so hard to figure out who is legit and who isn't. Any information that you have as a personal user for this service.
Hope you get some answers here good natured. I know how hard it is these days to trust any of these companies. I know they are not all fraud companies. I just feel people need to be careful when making a choice.
Do you think credit repair companies are always a scam?
The way I see it these companies have to pay their bills and their staff somehow. This means that they are getting money from ppl like you and me to pay YOUR bills and THEIR bills. So, I see it like this: It will sure be easier if you go to the full service pump but, You will sure pay for it in the end. Your better off getting off your rump and doing it yourself.
I think one should have a complete knowledge of the credit repair company first and then go for it. I think we can always share our experiences with credit repair companies in this forum so that people here will come to know who is doing frauds and who all are genuine.
There are sure enough frauds out there, where there is a way to scam, there are people out there that will do it. People get desperate and look for a way out and unfortunately find themselves dealing with people that don't have their best intrest in mind.
You should always fully investigate the company before handing over your hard earned cashed to them. coming here is a good way to find out what is really going on with a company. This is a good place to be.
Hi goodnatured
You are correct. This forum is a wonderful place to discuss about the credit repair companies and our experiences with such companies, so that others in the forum can be benefited.
It is actually nice to be able to help someone else. Having gone through times like these we all can feel for someone else who just began trying to get everything fixed.
You know what they say fireyone, experience is the best teacher, well even if we walk away from a bad experience with something learned it is not a total loss, we can then share the information and move on from there.
It is natural for us to get all stressed out when we hit these financial crisis, but what we take a way from it is invaluable. A kid won't touch a hot plate if they have been burned previously from it, so this is sometimes the way we learn.
I too think that even sharing bad experiences help us learn something. When anybody is hit by a financial crisis as goodnatured pointed out and he shares his situation with the forum, not only does he gets help of how to get out of the situation, but also others can gain knowledge of how to get out of the situation if faced with similar crisis. I myself have benefited by learning a lot from this forum
Do you think credit repair companies are always a scam?
For the most part they are
I have personally used lexington law and it is not a scam. My score raised about 40 points in six months. However i stopped using them when equifax sent me one of their letters claiming that they cannot verify information for a third party. Meaning it had to come directly from me. And when i looked at what they wrote it was as a 10 year old wrote the verification letter. Nothing fancy and nothing Lawyerly about it. So i decided instead of paying 60/month why not just do it myself. Which I did and I got better results. So my advice is that although they are not scams you can do probably a better job doing it yourself.
creditcardwarehouseonline can you put a sample letter on here so the rest of us can use it please?
There are many companies that are not a scam!!
Hi,
There are many Credit Repair Companies that are not a scam, but you have got to be careful. Make sure that they only bill you when work is completed and that they don't guarantee that they will clean up your reports, because you can't guarantee that. A good alternative is a guarantee where you don't pay for their service unless they are successful in improving your credit reports.
If you are looking for a Credit Repair Company, do yourself a favor and first look for a Credit Repair Guide and/or Credit Repair Analysis on the internet and if you get a good response you can move forward.
Good luck!! :D
True, always do your homework before investing your money. You can learn about credit repair and do it yourself, you end up with a good education on credit this way also.
You are right goodnatured. Although it is true that all credit repair companies are not scams, yet going for a credit repair companies will extract dollars out of you. Instead of spending dollars to repair credit, we can use these dollars to repay our debts. I think there are many pages in the creditmagic forum itself which gives us an idea of how to repair our own credit by just keeping track of our credit reports.
I know, we should work on a page that talks about credit repair, maybe we could all contribute to it and come up with a guide some how. I could use it myself. Is this something that you want to work on?
Thats a good idea, we should do one just on them, it would be easy to find and we could attempt to keep it organized.
I agree with Justin. The money spent on credit repair would help paying off other bills. Most of what they do people could do theirselves. There is actually things you have to do yourself anyway like verifying. I would like to see a site on the repair process.
Yes, some of the steps that we can take to repair our own credit may include:
1) keeping track of our credit report on a regular basis
2) notifying any discrepancies in the credit report immediately to the credit reporting agencies
3) sending a DV letter to the CAs if you find any listing that do not match with our record. Or you may even send a DV letter to validate your debt, and try to make the creditor agree for PFD.
4) Asking the creditor to delete any unauthorized hard inquiry if you find any in your credit report.
Pretty good advise once again Justin.
No
Never
Its not always put as a scam
it only depends upon the condition
I have gone through debt consolidation before, and everything worked out like I asked it would. My credit is better, and the fees were def. worth the experience.
I agree that it depends on the conditions and which company you choose. I chose a solid company, that I reviewed online for several weeks. Worked out perfectly!
Good thing to do JP. Never trust a company you haven't researched. A good place to start that research is BBB (better business Bureau). You can see complaints that have been filed and how they are rated. You amy also find ones that may help you by looking at hrier mreviews.
And you can always come here and look for advice, many people here have had experience with many different companies.
That is also a really good avenue to take as good natured suggests. You could post it as a quaestion and see if anyone else did any business with whom your are considering.