credit report - Disputing Credit Card Charges

Let's imagine for a moment that you've just received your credit card bill in the mail, and you think the only purchase you made with it the previous month was at the gas station. What do you do then, when you find three purchases at Old Navy, and a bunch of other purchases you know you didn't make? Do you know what rights you have regarding fraudulent purchases on a credit card in your name? How about your rights if you purchased an item with a credit card, but never received the products you ordered? If these problems have not happened to you yet, you are lucky. These are common situations credit card users face every day, and it can help you to know before something like this happens to you what your rights are, and what your responsibilities are in the matter. When You Are Not Satisfied With Purchase One of the benefits of using a credit card to make purchases is the additional protection they provide if you make a purchase that you are unsatisfied with. For example, maybe you used a credit card to pay the contractors who were hired to repair your shower leak, but there is still water on the bathroom floor. Obviously, you are not satisfied with the work they completed, and you don't want to pay for it. The problem is, you charged it on a credit card and now the bill has come! Your first step is to contact the contractor, or the merchant you made your purchase from. Most of the time, the merchant is more than happy to replace a broken item, perform the service again or refund the purchase back to your credit card. If you make a phone call, document it and follow up with a letter to cover your tracks in the event the merchant doesn't follow through. If for some reason the merchant decides they are not going to do anything to correct the situation, you should immediately contact your credit card company and report the information. Don't wait to report the problem on a later date- most credit card companies require you to report a problem as soon as you see it on the statement in order to benefit from any of the protection they provide. Charges You Didn't Make Did you know that federal law is involved in helping limit credit cardholder's responsibilities for charges on credit cards that they did not make themselves? The Fair Credit Billing Act actually limits your responsibility to just $50 for any charges you did not authorize. If you open your credit card bill and find charges not made by you, there is a process you should follow to get it resolved as quickly and painlessly as possible. Firstly, call the credit card company and explain the charges that were not made by you. They will give you instructions as to what to do next. Then, you should take the time to find and review all of your recent credit card statements in case there were other charges that you may have missed. The credit card company will most likely ask you to sign a form to confirm that you were not the one who made the charges in dispute. Don't use the card while you are disputing charges. Once you finally get a resolution and get the charges removed, be sure to order your credit report from all of the major credit bureaus in order to make sure that the record has been updated there- because chances are the time it takes to resolve fraudulent charges will have caused late payments on that credit card that may have been reported. You can get more information about credit card disputes from the Fair Trade Commission. This article has been provided courtesy of Creditor Web. Creditor Web offers great credit card articles available for reprint and other tools to help you search and compare credit cards. Article Source:http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Debbie_Dragon credit report - What Does Your Credit Report Say About You Years ago as a youngster I remember watching an episode of one of my favorite sketch comedies, in this particular episode a woman was about to venture out on a blind date. When her suitor arrived at her door she was pleasantly surprised to find a handsome man glancing back at her. Knowing that he'd successfully made it past the first hurdle judging by her positive areaction, he confidently started to joke with her. He then thoughtfully placed her coat around her shoulders and before the slipping out the door a fax started to arrive. She began to read it, her smile fading by the second. It was a background check on her date. She found out that he'd been married 3 times, relied on all his previous wives for alimony, was up to his ears in debt and served prison time for fraud. She ended the date before it even began. Although only a comedy sketch, it does run along similar lines of a credit report, your next date won't have privy to such intimate details of your financial situation, however, your bank or credit lenders do. Why Is So Much Importance Given to Credit Reports? It gives potential lending institutions a snapshot into your personal financial history. From this they can determine how you handle your current debt, if you pay your bills in a timely manner, how many loans you have and how much you owe. It also reveals if you've had troubles with other lending institutions in the past and if it required the assistance of a collections agency. This can be manifested as a negative mark against you in your report and adversely effect your credit rating. The whole point of the credit report from a lenders perspective is to see if you're a prime candidate to lend money to and the likelihood they're going to get that money back, period. In fact any lending institution will know if they're going to approve you within just 5 minutes of looking at your credit report. Imagine that, a life altering decision in the time it takes to cook an egg. Things that Can Go Against You If you have a sketchy payment history, this can be interpreted as negative from the eyes of the lending institution and be seen as a risk to lend you money. A high debt to income ratio. All they're concerned about is getting back the money they borrowed you with extra interest added on. The more you owe in relation to how much you make is a big concern for lenders as that means you'll struggle to meet your weekly/monthly commitments to them. Debt counseling also shows up on your credit report and raises concerns that you've had difficulty in managing your finances. Try to fix your credit as much as you can on your own. Carefully budget to catch up with lagging payments. If you need credit counseling then only do so as a last resort. How to Beef Up Your Credit You can strengthen your credit simply by disputing charges you're not responsible for and getting those negative marks on your credit report removed, why tolerate blemishes tarnishing your credit score when you don't have to? Write to the credit bureau and challenge any charges (accompanied with proof) you didn't incur. It may take a few attempts but persistency is the key. Create history. Establish a predictable pattern of payment by building a regular payment history. Banks and lending institutions like consistency, it means reliability and shows that you're good at paying your bills. Embrace your credit report. It pays to immerse yourself in your finances at least twice a year, that way you can track your own progress and quickly catch any inconsistencies or errors and correct them. This way you know your financial status and there are no surprises when it comes time to apply for a loan.