What is a Credit Report?

A Credit report holds crucial information about you, such as information about your identity, your professional and personal addresses, and other pertinent information. A credit report is used by a creditor to decide whether or not to extend a credit to you. Information such as your bill-paying habits and your credit history come into play when taking such a decision. Your credit report is created by credit reporting agencies or bureaus which send it to businesses for evaluation.

Why a Law?

The Fair Credit Reporting Act is a federal law that regulates credit reporting companies. The purpose of the act is to ensure “accuracy and fairness of credit reporting.” A lot of things, including the banking system, a debtor’s credit worthiness and capacity, consumer privacy, and creditor decisions on general consumer reputations are dependent on this Act.

How Does This Law Benefit?

These consumer reporting agencies disperse information if or when required by court order, requested by the individual consumer. The information can also be requested by a creditor or some other entity who may want to learn about the credit worthiness of a particular debtor; either with the intent of lending a debt, employment or setting up some type of a business relationship.

The debtor has the right to ask for a copy of their credit report at any point of time. This can be done by mail or phone.

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What is Fair Credit Reporting Act?

“The purpose of this [act] is to require that consumer reporting agencies adopt reasonable procedures for meeting the needs of commerce for consumer credit, personnel, insurance, and other information in a manner which is fair and equitable to the consumer, with regard to the confidentiality, accuracy, relevancy, and proper utilization of such information in accordance with the requirements of this [act].”

The primary purpose of the Fair Credit Reporting Act is to ensure fairness and accuracy of credit reporting, and that the procedures followed are reasonable.

Under the Fair Credit Reporting Act:

• If denied credit, insurance or employment on the basis of your credit report, you may ask the creditor for name and address of the reporting agency, and contact then within 60 days of receiving denial notice to get a free copy of your credit report.
• A credit reporting agency cannot give out information to employers, and certain other information of a specific nature, such as reports that contain medical information, without your consent.
• You can dispute completeness and accuracy of information in your file.
• Derogatory information that is outdated cannot be reported.
• You can seek damages from a reporting agency in a case where they violate the Fair Credit Reporting Act.
• You can request for your name to be removed from the list of reporting agencies. (But keep in mind that once you are off the list, you have to be off it for two years.)

How Do I Contact A Credit Reporting Agency?

There are primarily three national credit bureaus that supply credit reports; Experian, Equifax and Trans Union. You can look up "credit" or "credit rating and reporting" in the yellow pages and make calls, your information may be with more than one agency, calling up more than one is advisable. You will have pay a reasonable fee to get your report.

After the difficult and complex process of bankruptcy, debtors often wonder when they will stand back up on their feet again.  Despite how bleak your financial condition might seem with some good planning and time you can once again be financially secure.  After filing for bankruptcy, your credit rating would definitely be affected, but there are things you can do to once again establish your credit. 

Since the Bankruptcy Code and the Fair Credit Reporting Act are federal laws, the period during which bankruptcy details will still be included in your credit report is constant for all states.  A consumer credit report that store information about bankruptcy for 10 years.  The fact is that it takes about 18 months of paying your bills on time to re-establish a good credit rating which would prove that you can manage your finances sensibly.  For those who have filed for bankruptcy, re-establishing credit would be an even more difficult task.  However, it is possible to have good credit ratings once again.

The first and most important thing to do is to get a job. For a start, even a part time job will be sufficient. The purpose is to create a steady work record as soon as possible. You have to also have to obtain credit records from the three credit bureaus. Once you have your credit report, ensure that all the information on it is correct and you can send in a 100 word statement that give good explanations for your situation, if at all you had a problem.