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Credit repair services
Hiring a company that offers credit repair services sounds like the easy way. After all, going through a lot of numbers, percentages, and legal terms can be confusing. But engaging a credit repair company can also be dangerous. It can be the fatal turn towards absolute financial ruin. There are many scams and con artists out there that pose as credit repair organizations. To spot and avoid them, here are some alarm signals. First, they demand payment before the credit repair is accomplished. Second, they warn against contacting a credit reporting agency. Third, they offer a new credit identity using an EIN (Employment Identification Number) instead of the Social Security Number. And fourth, they advise the client to do something illegal such as challenging all information in the credit report, including the accurate ones.
However, this does not mean that there are no legitimate credit repair companies. Before engaging the services of such a company, a person must be aware of his legal rights while working with such a company. These legal rights are based on a document created for the Credit Repair Organizations Act and supported by both State and Federal laws. Some of these legal rights include the following: The credit repair company could not charge the client anything until it has accomplished the services laid out in a contract.
The contract must first be signed before the credit repair company can take action and even if it has been signed, there is a three-day grace period where the client can cancel the said contract without any financial obligations. And finally, the contract must contain specific details about total cost of the services, the exact description of said services, the time table, and the profile of the credit repair company. If the client encounters problems with the credit repair company, these can be reported to the Attorney General of the state.
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