Removing late payments from a credit report
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Stuart Hunter
Providing credit repair services since 1991, Lexington Law has helped over 500,000 clients legally take on their credit. Last year alone, Lexington Law helped clients remove over 600,000 negative items from their credit reports.
By Stuart Hunter
Published on November 24, 2009
Late payments can take a serious toll on your credit score, especially if payments are reported to be of 90 days late or more. If you're looking to raise your credit score, it's worth it to look into the things you can do in an attempt to remove late payments from your credit reports.
Removing late payments from a credit report
Depending on how late a creditor reports you were on a payment, even a single late payment on your credit reports can do some serious damage to your credit rating. One 90-day late payment reported to the credit bureaus can damage your credit score as much as a collection account, judgment, or tax lien.
30 and 60 day late payments don't count as heavily against your credit score, but if you have multiple delinquencies on your credit reports, don't be surprised when your credit isn't as good as you would prefer it to be.
Regardless of whether a late payment is reported as 30, 60, 90, or 120 days late, your credit rating would likely be higher if it didn't appear on your credit reports at all. Just about everyone would want to have this damaging credit listing erased, but few realize there is something they can do about it. What they are not aware of is that there are steps you can take in an effort to delete late payments from your credit reports. In fact, Lexington Law, a consumer advocacy law firm with 18 years of experience helping over 1/2 million Americans work to improve their credit, reports that their clients had over 140,000 late payments removed from their credit reports in 2008.
You have a number of options when it comes to repairing your credit. For starters, under the Fair Credit Reporting Act, you can request the credit bureaus verify any items in your credit reports you feel may be inaccurate, untimely, misleading, incomplete, ambiguous, unverifiable, biased or unclear (known as "questionable" items). Essentially, you have the right to question any items in your credit reports you feel give others an unfair or inaccurate impression of your credit worthiness; including late payments.
If a credit bureau dispute doesn't result in a removal or if the reported late payment does not qualify as a questionable negative item, there are still options available to you. Your creditors have the ability to remove the items they have added to your credit reports. Sometimes, simply as a result of you asking nicely, they will agree to stop reporting a negative item. If a friendly request doesn't do the job, there are a number of more confrontational things you can do based on your rights under consumer protection laws such as the Fair Credit Billing Act and the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act.
It may not be easy, but with time, effort, and proper knowledge, you may be able to remove late payments from your credit reports. Of course, if you do not have the time or the desire to attempt repairing your own credit, there are a number of reputable credit repair companies who will use their knowledge and experience to aid you in working towards your credit goals.
30 and 60 day late payments don't count as heavily against your credit score, but if you have multiple delinquencies on your credit reports, don't be surprised when your credit isn't as good as you would prefer it to be.
Regardless of whether a late payment is reported as 30, 60, 90, or 120 days late, your credit rating would likely be higher if it didn't appear on your credit reports at all. Just about everyone would want to have this damaging credit listing erased, but few realize there is something they can do about it. What they are not aware of is that there are steps you can take in an effort to delete late payments from your credit reports. In fact, Lexington Law, a consumer advocacy law firm with 18 years of experience helping over 1/2 million Americans work to improve their credit, reports that their clients had over 140,000 late payments removed from their credit reports in 2008.
You have a number of options when it comes to repairing your credit. For starters, under the Fair Credit Reporting Act, you can request the credit bureaus verify any items in your credit reports you feel may be inaccurate, untimely, misleading, incomplete, ambiguous, unverifiable, biased or unclear (known as "questionable" items). Essentially, you have the right to question any items in your credit reports you feel give others an unfair or inaccurate impression of your credit worthiness; including late payments.
If a credit bureau dispute doesn't result in a removal or if the reported late payment does not qualify as a questionable negative item, there are still options available to you. Your creditors have the ability to remove the items they have added to your credit reports. Sometimes, simply as a result of you asking nicely, they will agree to stop reporting a negative item. If a friendly request doesn't do the job, there are a number of more confrontational things you can do based on your rights under consumer protection laws such as the Fair Credit Billing Act and the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act.
It may not be easy, but with time, effort, and proper knowledge, you may be able to remove late payments from your credit reports. Of course, if you do not have the time or the desire to attempt repairing your own credit, there are a number of reputable credit repair companies who will use their knowledge and experience to aid you in working towards your credit goals.