How Do You Get Something Off Of Your Credit Report?
How to Remove the Hard enquires from Your Credit Report
Each time you apply for a credit card, car loan, mortgage, or any type of financially-based account then the credit company will pull credit through credit reporting. This is referred to as a hard inquiry. While hard inquiries do not have a very negative impact on credit scores, they tend to be slightly detrimental and can last on your credit reports for up to two years. Though the effect of a hard inquiry is not so severe, if there are many such inquiries within a short time, it will be considered as an undesirable factor by other lenders and they will affect your credit.
Whether you have some wrong hard inquiries on your reports that you do not need, or inquiries for accounts that you never opened, you will need to ask for their deletion. Here is some advice to follow when attempting to dispute hard inquiries on your credit reports.
Review Your Credit Reports
The first move is to check all the hard inquiries from at least the last year by getting your credit reports from Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion, depending on where the credit accounts were reported. You can get your reports here for free and it will be from each of the three major credit bureaus at AnnualCreditReportcom. Or, there is an option to go for the free service, such as Credit Karma, to check both Equifax and TransUnion reports.
When reviewing the report, make sure to flag any hard inquiry that you made for an account you never obtained. Inquiries normally remain on your reports for about two years from the time of the request. In the case of a hard inquiry, if your credit check is older than two years and it is still showing up, then that should be considered a red flag. Prepare a list of any hard inquiries that you have any doubts about and decide that you are going to fight.
Go to See the Lender
Before responding to this kind of inquiry defensively or going on the attack, communicate with the lender who inquired question. It might be for a reason; there may be something logical behind it being still shown. Inform them that you did not commence an account with them, and request that they expunge or mask the unused inquiry from your credit files.
Ask them to send a written request to the credit bureaus to request for removal if you did not authorize the information or it was input by mistake. This is particularly true because it is usually the most efficient method of eliminating an undesired inquiry from the credit report.
This can be evidenced by the fact that the consumer has a dispute with the credit bureaus and no proof that it was in a particular format.
If communicating with the lender is not useful to remove the erroneous hard inquiry, then you can dispute it with the credit reporting companies. Each credit reporting agency is independently operated and as such, you will have to challenge Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion.
It can be done either through the online form or by calling the dispute resolution center or sending a letter to it. Basic account information should include your full name, preferably your date of birth or the last four digits of your social security number, your current residential address, as well as your account number if any. Explain clearly why the hard inquiry in question is inaccurate, such as listing the date, and company name, and reasoning like doing them, beware of did not open this account, did not authorize credit check, etc.
Ask for references if possible such as job descriptions, organizational charts, or personnel files. This should comprise scanned images or photocopies of emails/letters from the lender indicating that they inquired error. You should enclose your written request to delete the hard inquiry and preserve copies of letters, emails, or any other means of communication and their proofs of transmission.
The credit bureaus in America are under the Fair Credit Reporting Act, and in the event of a dispute, they have 30 days to investigate and determine whether the information should remain in your file or not. Usually, you will be provided with status reports and reply letters containing conclusions of their ‘investigations’. If an inquiry was noted to be proven true, ask for more details on how those results were reached.
If the bureaus decide their investigations and provide you with the information that the inquiry should remain in your credit profile, then it is not too early to go back to them and use other information to prove why they should delete the inquiry. Stay on top of it and keep disputing errors whenever they are necessary until credit reporting agencies agree to delete hard inquiries that should not be on the report.
Seek Legal Action
As earlier mentioned, if you have tried different tactics to compel the lender or the credit bureau to seize the hard inquiry without success, then you may have no option but to seek legal redress. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau can be reached for filing a complaint against the lender or credit bureau. You also have a right to sue for damages under the FCRA or the Fair Credit Billing Act.
It is highly advisable to seek the services of a lawyer whose practice is in consumer law, especially in cases against credit issuers and agencies. They’ll review the details and papers of your case to find out if you might have a claim in the small claims court or through a settlement. In the event you get a judgment against an entity that violates the law, you will get an order requiring corrections to be made to credit reports that have inaccurate information and monetary awards. Though legal action may turn the tide in your favor, it must be noted that it is very time-consuming and costly as well, therefore when choosing this option, one must consider whether the benefits outweigh the costs.
Most importantly, do not apply for too many credit cards because this will lead to too many hard inquiries on your credit report.
However, you must understand that a single hard credit check does not necessarily have a significantly adverse effect on your credit score; though multiple inquiries within a short span will. Every claim to hard inquiry leads to a decrease of three to five points on the credit score, though temporary.
Too many inquiries are also detrimental because they give signals to your credit appetite or risk level, which also lowers the score further. Do not make several credit applications – use credit only in those cases when you need it, for instance when opening a new account or applying for a loan. Also, applications should be limited to a period of a maximum of thirty days as several requests are combined into one when making a tally. Even when you are shopping around for auto, mortgage, or student loans through a service, such as LendingTree, it only produces one hard inquiry.
Review your credit report for signs of fraudulent activity and make sure there are no unnecessary credit checks on your report. It is always helpful to be more alert to notice such mistakes at an early stage so that they cannot compound the situation over time. Do not use too much available credit as this will be reported on your credit report, and do not wait for hard inquiries to appear on your credit report to remove them, but rather be keen on removing them as soon as possible to have the best credit score possible.
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