Can You Trust Credit Repair Firms

 Is Dr. Credit a Quack?

There is a big market for Credit Repair companies that is cluttered, unfortunately, with firms that promise the impossible.  Credit report repair can not be accomplished in 30 days.  Anyone guaranteeing this is most likely a scam.

Think that one through.  A company guaranteeing a repaired credit report in thirty days.  If you have read any of the articles we have here on repairing credit, or better yet, if you have started to deal with the credit reporting agencies yourself, you know very little or nothing will happen in thirty days.  Repairing credit is a process requiring patience.  It is estimated that Americans have been bilked out of 50 million plus dollars by "credit doctor" credit repair frauds.  

So are they all scams?  The answer is no.  However, credit repair is a market that can easily play on fear and consumer ignorance.  If you need credit repair, you probably just want to get it over with, a quick fix, guaranteed, probably sounds like a good deal.  Trust me it isn't. 

We have laws that give the consumer rights and the dispute process is fairly straight forward.  The real difficulty in repairing your credit report is the adversarial relationship between the consumer and the credit reporting agencies. Basically you are telling the credit bureau that they are wrong. They don't generate the items you are disputing, they merely list them. That means they have to go to the time and expense to verify or validate the item with the creditor or other source who submitted it.   

Credit reporting agencies are for profit organizations.  The cost of dealing with disputes comes off their bottom line much like warranty work on an automobile is to a car manufacturer.  Something broke and now they have to pay to fix it.  You are not their customer, the creditors are.  Don't expect the agency to be a helpful buddy in this process. 

So if you are going to attempt credit repair yourself, you have to have the grit and determination to put up with a lot of frustration. 

If that sounds like too much, then search out a legitimate credit repair organization.  They're out there and thousands of negative items are removed every day.  The one that we believe has demonstrated their effectiveness both by the number of clients they have severed and the number of negative items removed, and more importantly, their philosophy of setting realistic goals and time tables can be found here. 

Credit repair, if you do it yourself or hire a firm, is not an overnight process. It takes time, and if you are doing it yourself, a lot of determination.