Credit Report Disputes

Many times, inaccurate information will appear on your credit report. In my experiences, one of the most common mistakes credit reporting agencies make is that they mix up the credit information of family members with the same name. For example, my father and I share the same name. I cannot tell you how many times my father’s credit accounts have shown up on my credit report. It is very frustrating, however, all one can do is fix the inaccuracy.

The easiest way to remove inaccurate information is to dispute the inaccuracy. The three main credit bureaus (Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion) all have options where a person can dispute inaccurate information through the respective credit bureau’s website. First, you should only dispute the inaccurate information to the credit bureau that has reported the inaccurate information. Therefore, if the inaccurate information is reported only in your Equifax report, there is no need to dispute anything in your TransUnion report because the inaccurate information is not in your TransUnion report. It is important to note that these three credit bureaus are completely separate entities. Therefore, for example, if inaccurate information appears in your TransUnion and Equifax report and you successful get the inaccurate information removed from your TransUnion report, that does not mean that Equifax has to also remove the information.

I wish the process was as easy as sending in a dispute of inaccurate information and waiting for the inaccuracy to be removed from your credit report. However, it is not that simple. Credit reporting agencies are very stubborn. Things will not be easy and you may have to dispute the same inaccuracy more than once. However, with persistence, you should be able to remove inaccurate information.