Credit Repair

Some of the phony credit repair places blitz credit bureaus with disputes about anything and everything. In the past, this might have been temporarily effective if the credit bureaus removed the disputed items while they investigated. These days, though, the bad stuff typically stays on your file during the investigation, so you don’t even get a temporary boost. Even when you do, most or all of the negative items simply come right back as soon as the original creditor confirms that they’re correct. What might not come back are the accounts that are helping your score. The creditors might not bother to respond to the bureaus’ requests for confirmation, and you could end up making matters worse.

Disputing too many items at once is also a good way to convince credit bureaus that you’re filing “frivolous” disputes, and they might refuse to investigate at all.

To be on the safe side, don’t dispute more than three or four negative items at once, unless your disputes are related. And don’t pay anyone a fat fee to do this for you.