Starting the Credit Repair Process

The first thing you must do in order to start repairing or improving your credit yourself is getting your credit report. This is a fairly simple process and you can gain access to your reports from the big 3 credit bureaus (Equifax, Experian, TransUnion) instantly online. The key thing is to make sure you get a current credit report from all the major credit bureaus. You should also get your credit report from Innovis. However, you can't (at this point) gain instant access online instantly. Innovis requires you to call them up, request a copy by mail, and at that point, they'll mail it to you. This process usually takes about 5-7 business days to receive your credit report by mail from the date you made the request. With the report you receive, Innovis will include a username and password for you to access your report online, if you did need to dispute anything. You can visit our Credit Bureaus page and visit each of the credit bureau's website as well as take advantage of a 30 day free trial offered by some of the credit bureaus.

Which company should you get your credit report from? Well, in all actuality, you can get it from any company offering a credit report, some will even offer a free trial. Federal law mandates or entitles you to at least 1 free credit report from each of the 3 major credit bureaus (Equifax, Experian, TransUnion) once every 12 months. You can take this route to avoid any free trial sign ups as well.  AnnualCreditReport.com is the site to visit if that is the way you'd like to go.

Please Note: The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has issued new regulations regarding the advertisement of "free credit reports," which goes into effect on April 2, 2010. The new regulations are designed to protect consumers from being misled by offers for "free" credit reporting, monitoring or other products or services that actually cost money. When this law takes effect, all websites that offer free credit reports must include the following disclosure at the top of each page that mentions "free credit reports":

THIS NOTICE IS REQUIRED BY LAW. Read more at FTC.gov .
You have the right to a free credit report from AnnualCreditReport.com
or 877-322-8228, the ONLY authorized source under federal law.


In any case, the first step is gaining access to each of your credit reports. The reason for this: Each of the bureaus are independent of the others, they get information about your accounts from a source reporting the information. This factor alone could mean your reports are different and more times then not, they are different. If you were to work on repairing your credit from 1 credit report, you may find out that there were more negative accounts or incorrect info in the other credit reports.

(Back) Credit Repair - (Next) Credit Report Info