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Christmas (yes I said the ‘C’ word — Ho! Ho! Ho!) is just around the corner and consumer spending is once again at an all time high. For those of you that are struggling from the effects of bad credit the holiday season offers a small window of opportunity which, if acted upon, could open many possibilities for you in the New Year.

People often ask me why the holidays are the best time to repair their credit. Well, I have a theory. In preparation for the flood of holiday credit applications creditors shift gears and temporarily transfer dispute resolution staff to other divisions to handle the unusually high volume of new business. Being that the creditors make much more money increasing their customer base it seems understandable that they justify slacking off in the dispute department for a month or so each year. This temporary trend allows for your disputes to go unanswered which results in the items being deleted.

Another more obvious reason is that the holiday season is a time of vacation, cheer, forgiveness, charity and new beginnings. This combination tips the scales in your favor in a measurable way. It is common knowledge among credit professionals that this time of the year is perfect for disputing credit items on your credit report. The law states that if you dispute something on your credit report the credit bureaus have thirty days in which to verify that the item is valid or remove it. The vision of an understaffed creditor’s office with phones ringing off the hook and overworked employees surfing the net for last minute gift comes to mind. Your chances are great.

Now comes the hard part. Where do you start? Allow me to point you in the right direction. While each major credit bureau (Experian, Equifax and TransUnion) has online disputing methods we have found them to be more trouble than they are worth, often taking hours to dredge through and providing dismal results when you do. Besides, you want a paper trail and return receipt snail mail is still the only way. What we recommend you do is obtain an inexpensive how to book or even better, an e-book with templates and devote an hour to doing it yourself. We have one featured at our website (link below) that is a 1,2,3, kit designed to have you finished in about an hour.

You may also choose to pay money for a company to assist you. This is also a good option. There are many reputable credit repair companies online. Before you do that and commit to $50 to $100 per month for twelve to eighteen months do yourself a favor and check out how easy it is to do it yourself.

Wishing you and yours a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Copyright December 2005, yourcreditcures.com, USA

Tad MacPherson is a credit specialist with years of experience assisting consumers with repairing, restoring and reestablishing their credit. Get free advice and valuable credit tools at http://www.yourcreditcures.com.
ATTENTION Ezine Editors/Site Owners Feel free to reprint this article in it’s entirety in your ezine or on your website as long as you leave all the links in place, do not modify the content and include our resource box as listed above.

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Identity theft is the number one crime in America. Tens of thousands of people that have always paid their bills on time are waking up one day to discover their bank accounts drained, maxed out credit cards in their name and their credit ruined.

Two weeks ago I became a victim of credit card fraudand I am as careful as you can be. Dealing with fraud victims on a daily basis has taught me to constantly monitor my credit profile and bank accounts. In this particular case someone had obtained my bank debit card Visa information and was running up thousands of dollars in charges. Had I not been in the habit of monitoring my finances on an almost daily basis I may have been writing this in despair, my hard earned money mounted in the form of a new plasma screen television on the wall of some cunning crook.

In my case I was alerted to the illegal activity by a not so pleasant visit to my online bank account. After picking myself off of the floor and allowing the color to return to my cheeks I immediately placed a call to my bank to cancel the card. Luckily, my bank offers free fraud protection, but many don’t. If your bank does not offer this important service I recommend you change banks.

I discovered the activity before the items had even posted. The money was drawn into credit escrow and was not showing in my account but the funds had not yet been released. My next call was to the actual companies that had posted the transactions to my account. They were listed under ‘pending transactions’. After a handful of telephone calls I was able to cancel all of the transactions illegally charged to my account. I was lucky and within twenty-four hours the funds were credited back to my balance. Keep in mind that I speak at credit restoration seminars and teach people how to protect themselves from these predators. Fortunately, I also practice what I preach. In this case it saved my hide.

When it comes down to it, the only sure way to avoid identity theft is to cancel any accounts that can be electronically accessed. Since this is not an option in today’s day and age I will give you a short list of precautions recommended to protect yourself and your family from potentially catastrophic damage to your finances and credit rating.

Recommendation #1: Make sure every credit card and bank account you use has free identity theft and fraud insurance. When I fell victim I was immediately relieved because my bank had my backside covered.

Recommendation #2: Have a specialists make certain that your computer is adequately fire-walled and any wireless network has active security. It is easy for a hacker to acquire your information if this is not the case. They have programs that track every keystroke on your computer and use these programs to steal your information.

Recommendation #3: Carefully monitor your bank accounts on a daily basis. The criminal that stole my information was careful to make the transactions on the weekend, early morning when I was unlikely to discover the activity.

Recommendation #4: Purchase some form of Credit Monitoring program. Many of these online programs are worth their weight in gold. Not only do they alert you to changes in balances and additions of derogatory credit but more importantly they alert you if any credit cards are taken out in your name. That is how they strike hardest. By setting you up on paper at a new address and opening up new accounts in your name.

Recommendation #5: Purchase a home/office shredder and use it. Dumpster diving is still well utilized for obtaining consumer information.

By taking these simple steps you will be shielding yourself and your family from possible attack. The threat of having your identity and money stolen is real and without an active program in place you may find yourself broke and fighting an uphill battle to restore your finances and your credit. You never think it will happen to you until it does. Take my word for it!

Copyright December 2005, yourcreditcures.com, USA

Tad MacPherson is a credit specialist with years of experience assisting consumers with repairing, restoring and reestablishing their credit. Get free advice and valuable credit tools at http://www.yourcreditcures.com.
ATTENTION Ezine Editors/Site Owners Feel free to reprint this article in it’s entirety in your ezine or on your website as long as you leave all the links in place, do not modify the content and include our resource box as listed above.

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If you’ve taken a look online, you’ve probably found a number of sites that offer to provide you with a free credit report. But is it really free? That’s not easy to answer. It’s quite possible that you won’t need to pay for the report with money, but you may find yourself paying in other ways once you’ve entered in all your personal information. Some companies will then use that information to pester you with spam, junk mail or even annoying phone calls. So in many ways, a free online credit report really isn’t free at all. Quite often you will need to sign up for an offer, which might include a trial membership to service that traces and looks for irregularities in your credit history. You may even have to sign for services that have nothing to do with getting a free online credit report.

In the end, you might actually be better trying to find a credit report online that’s cheap, although the free ones might still be worth it. After all, it’s important to keep your credit history clear, and it can be a good idea to check what’s listed on your history before you apply for a loan. Do you remember when you changed addresses and missed the last cable payment? That’s a black mark on your credit history. Running late with a credit card payment? That’s on there as well. All of these things damage your credit, and if there’s enough of these little slip ups on your credit record, you may find it difficult to get a loan from a regular lender. It’s also possible that there are things on there that have nothing to do with you, and have either been placed against your name by mistake or by someone committing fraud.

Identity theft is on the rise, and a criminal may have been using your personal information to buy cellular phones and order credit cards. Once they have your name and identity, they can rent a home in your name or apply for loans. Unless you regularly check your credit report, you might not even know that these things are happening until one day you’re refused credit and you don’t know why. It’s much harder to clean your credit history than it is to mess it up in the first place, so checking it regularly can be insurance against having a big mess to clean up down the track. Removing all the fraudulent entries can take as much as a year, and will cause you a lot of hard work and frustration. Getting regular credit reports can be costly, and that’s why it might be worth getting a free credit report online, even if you have to put up with a few junk letters afterwards.

If you want to read lots more great information about credit reports and repairing your credit history, go to http://badcreditsolutionszone.com

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