Can late payments be erased from a credit reports?
- By Stuart Hunter
- Published 11/24/2009
- Credit
- Unrated
Can late payments be erased from a credit reports?
Depending on how late a creditor reports you were on a payment, even a single late payment on your credit reports can do serious damage to your credit score. One 90-day late payment on your credit reports can be as damaging to your credit score as a collection account, judgment, or tax lien.
30 and 60 day late payments don't make as big of an impact on your credit score, but if you have a number of these negative listings listed on your credit reports, it shouldn't come as a surprise when your credit score isn't as high as you would prefer it to be.
Whether a late payment is reported as 30, 60, 90, or 120 days past due, your credit would likely be higher if it didn't show up on your credit reports at all. Just about everyone would want to have this damaging credit listing cleaned up, but few realize there is anything they can do about it. What they are not aware of is that there are steps you can take in an effort to remove 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 clearing up your credit. Under the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA), you have the right to 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 you feel give others an unfair 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 doesn't 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 whenever they have reason to do so. On occasion, simply as a result of you asking nicely, they will agree to stop reporting a negative item. If this doesn't do the job, there are a number of more confrontational steps you can take based on your rights under consumer protection acts 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 achieving your credit goals.
30 and 60 day late payments don't make as big of an impact on your credit score, but if you have a number of these negative listings listed on your credit reports, it shouldn't come as a surprise when your credit score isn't as high as you would prefer it to be.
Whether a late payment is reported as 30, 60, 90, or 120 days past due, your credit would likely be higher if it didn't show up on your credit reports at all. Just about everyone would want to have this damaging credit listing cleaned up, but few realize there is anything they can do about it. What they are not aware of is that there are steps you can take in an effort to remove 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 clearing up your credit. Under the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA), you have the right to 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 you feel give others an unfair 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 doesn't 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 whenever they have reason to do so. On occasion, simply as a result of you asking nicely, they will agree to stop reporting a negative item. If this doesn't do the job, there are a number of more confrontational steps you can take based on your rights under consumer protection acts 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 achieving your credit goals.
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.
View all articles by Stuart Hunter