It was my foolishness that I didn’t take care of that first late payment and finance charge due to first late rolled into another month’s payment and it kept resulting into late payment and interest charges for next couple of months. I didn’t realize it right away because the auto-pay amount(i had initially set up and not good anymore due to finance charge after first late payment) kept deducting from checking account.

Long story short, I got letter from BOA for late payments and talking to them over the phone, they said my a/c has been marked as high risk account due to this delinquency.

Today i got letters from 2 different credit card companies (including BOA) saying my credit line has been decreased.

I do understand it was major oversight on my sight, and I should have looked into, however, considering I paid off my account right after I found this out,

Is there any angle I can work off to get that bad spot off my credit history now ?

I already spoke to BOA credit beaurue and they say they can’t help it

I would really appreciate some serious advice as to how to fix this bad accident on my credit history to avoid future issues.

Thanks
UN

Be careful with your credit – Military Identity Theft

While those of us who serve in the American military may be used to some extra risks in life; it is the unexpected ones that can really surprise us. One such risk is the larger chance for identity theft.

Douglas Aaron, a credit repair lawyer states that, Military are often focused on by criminals for credit identity theft because they are usually out of the country for long periods of time. Thieves who go to the trouble of stealing other individuals information don’t like to be quickly shut down. People who go on a tour-of-duty for a year or more allow such an opportunity.

Once a criminal has obtained your particulars, including your social security number, name and birthday, they will start opening new lines of credit, taking personal loans and buying cellular service.

More sophisticated identity theft will add some form of picture ID for larger bank loans, car loans or camper loans.

Anyway, returning home to a huge amount of bills or trying to make purchase with your credit only to realize it has been ruined by thieves is something no one should have to deal with. To add insult to injury, fixing the situation often requires months to a year or more to iron out all the problems created by this type of theft.

Cory Baker, a North Carolina resident said: “I served my country for two years, out of the country. This was not the type of homecoming I hoped for. Proving to the courts that I did not make $7,000 in phone bills to Greece takes a lot of time and is utterly distracting.”

Many of these types of problems could have been prevented or stopped a lot sooner with a little more attention to ones finances, especially monitoring ones credit report.

Knowing what is on our report, cleaning up and fixing mistakes, constantly trying to increase your credit score, is something we can all benefit from doing, says Douglas Aaron. If you don’t know your score, how will you know if its gone down?

At the very least, order your scores today. Today’s economic problems demand our attention; they demand we are prepared for emergencies.

It is a sad fact that many individuals in debt today will never be able to say that they are completely free of their creditors. With the cost of living rising and the level of salary payments struggling to keep up, there is less disposable income on offer and debts are rising as a result, to the point that some individuals can no longer afford to repay them at all. That is where the IVA debt help can come in handy.

The Individual Voluntary Agreement (IVA) is a way to get out of debt, often within 5 years. Every month you pay a certain amount of what you owe, and when you are done, whatever amount was left is written off. That means that when your IVA debt solution is over, you do not owe your creditors anything and you can start anew.

The IVA debt help is a formal document – an agreement between you and your creditors – that ensures that you are able to pay at least part of your debt back. This is done using an Insolvency Practitioner who makes sure that the agreement is kept by both sides. For 5 years (usually) you will be making lower repayments that are more manageable to you, and then your debt will be written off and you will no longer be in debt.

The purpose of the IVA was to try to help people in debt get rid of their debt without having to go bankrupt, and to help creditors get back as much of their money as is feasible. When you apply for an IVA, your company will look at all your income and assets to see how high your repayments can realistically be.

Your income and assets include your regular income, income from other third parties, savings, investments, and assets such as equity in properties or significant jewelry.

All of these assets can actually determine just how much you can afford to pay back. Only disposable income is taken into account so an individual applying for an agreement will be able to afford the bills and housing costs, as well as having enough left over to eat and enjoy life to a certain degree!

In the same way that bankruptcy involved court action, so does an Individual Voluntary Arrangement. The court must be informed and appoint the Insolvency Practitioner to help you and to supervise your repayments over the years governed by the agreement.

All in all, an Individual Voluntary Agreement can be a good idea for many individuals facing the breadline and deliver peace of mind. After the stress that comes from being heavily in debt, this will no doubt make a welcome change!

A report out from the UK Insurer AXA suggests the UK public is drowning in debt with 11.6 million people (25 per cent of the adult population) saying are under pressure financially with a momentous number, around one million three hundred thousand people, admitting their finances are entirely unmanageable.

The insurer goes on to say that over a million UK residents have borrowed too much credit and are now struggling to keep up their repayments, with less than 4 million struggling to manage their credit card bills.

County Court Judgements CCJ’s issued to the personal consumer has increased to their highest level since the beginning of 2007 and half a million home owners with mortgages where threatened with repossession or court action.

The public interest Company that manages the register of judgements on behalf of the Lord Chancellor has reported that within England and Wales County Court Judgements rose by 17.4 per cent year on year to 223,519, its highest level since the beginning of 2007 and from the second quarter of 2008 this is a 25 per cent increase.

Personal Insolvencies within England and Wales rose to just of twenty seven thousand in quarter 3 of 2008 which represents an 8.8 percent increase from just less that 25,000 in the previous quarter.

17,341 people went bankrupt, which has shot up 12.1 per cent from 15,463 in the second quarter of the year, and 9,746 individual voluntary arrangements (IVAs), which is up 3.3 per cent from the three months before.

The credit crunch could be blamed for the increase in corporate and personal insolvency throughout 2008, however, its patently obvious that further failures are going to be compounded by the recession throughout 2009.

It was hoped that the SIVA, planned for release in early 2009 would help with some of the debt burden, however, the Insolvency Service has just abandoned the concept.

A simplified version of the IVA, for consumers with debts up to 75,000 and that would only require approval by a simple majority of creditors rather than the 75 per cent majority under normal IVAs, was due to be introduced in April 2009.

UK Home Owners unable to consolidate their debts using equity and are not wishing to go bankrupt have for the time being limited options between an IVA and a Debt Management Program.

There are many things you can do to repair your credit. It may take a little time but it is the best thing that you can do. Good credit means a lot. You can repair your credit by consolidation or on your own.

Credit is everything in the world today. Bad credit looks like you don’t pay your bills on time. It makes you look like you are not responsible and you don’t take care of your debts also. You have to have good credit if you want to buy a home, a car, and obtain credit cards. Some employers will not hire you if you do not have good credit also. Credit affects people in many ways and it is important to repair your credit if it is in bad shape. Credit is never irreparable.

The first step you need to take in repairing your credit is obtaining all three credit reports from the major credit bureaus. The major credit bureaus are Trans Union, Equifax, and Experian. Everyone is entitled to a free credit report every year. This will give you the opportunity to see what your score is, who your creditors are, and more. The three reports will not be identical. It is common to see a debtor on one agency report but not on another. Your scores may also be different too. This is common.

If you have a lot of debt that you owe you can still repair your credit yourself. You should pay off the smaller debts first that you can afford to pay in full, all at once. Some of the collection agencies will take a percentage of what you owe. Find out if anyone will accept a partial payoff for the balances. The larger debts you will need to work out a payment plan with these debtors. This is important. Remember that once you make a deal with these collectors you need to stick to paying off the debt as you promise.

Another thing you can consider when you want to repair your credit is that you can get a consolidation loan to pay it off. Many people consider consolidation loans when they are in debt in large amounts. This will pay off all of your debt at once, which looks great on your credit. Then you will have one easy monthly payment that you have to make to pay off the consolidation loan. This is a great idea but you must pay off this loan.

Repairing your credit is easy. It will take a commitment from you to finish paying off your debts. Once you start the process you should not stop because you think your scores are at a good enough level. Pay off all of your debts the best you can because your scores will be higher and you will have a better quality of life.

You do not have to just wait for negative marks on your credit report to fall off. You can remove them and improve your credit score.

The Fair Credit Reporting Act says that you can dispute any item that you do not believe to be accurate on your credit report. It also says that any item that can not be verified must be removed from your credit.

To dispute an item you must create a dispute letter and send it to each credit bureau. You can hire a service to create this letter or do it yourself.

The bureau will receive your dispute and investigate. They will contact the lender and ask them to verify the dates on the account and the balance.

If the creator is unable to verify the account then it must be deleted from your report. The easiest items to remove have been learned to be a charge off, repossession and a late payment after they have aged for two years.

This is because the creditor has gotten some form of payment for your debt. For example with a charged off credit card the creditor has sold your debt to a debt collector. Therefore the creditor has no reason to save records of your account.

With judgments, bankruptcies, tax liens and recent delinquent accounts it is more difficult to remove these items from your credit. If you have one of these we suggest a service because they have more tactics they can use to remove an item.

A service can use more advanced methods to remove an item if it is verified by the lender. A service can use; creditor direct intervention, escalated dispute information requests, and debt validation.

You can also help your credit score by opening a revolving unsecured credit line. This will help your score because you can create a positive payment history and improve your ratio of debt to available credit.

In sum you do not have to wait seven years to repair your credit. You can have a good credit score by removing derogatory items and building a positive payment history.

The baby phat rush card is a prepaid credit card. It was created by Russell Simmons he co founded the popular Def Jam record label.

This is how the rush card works; you deposit money into your card/account, then you use your card to make purchases, money is taken out of your account to pay for those purchases. This card does offer guaranteed approval.

There is no chex systems check or a credit check. The rush card comes as a black card and the baby phat rush card is a pink card.

With this card you have free direct deposit. To enroll in this you only have to fill out a form and turn that into your employer or payroll department.

Then your paychecks will be directly deposited into your rush card account. You will still receive pay stubs to inform you of hours worked and what your deposit is.

This card can be used at ATM’s over 800,000 locations throughout the world. In addition you get free online account access.

You can make purchases using your rush card online and over the phone. You can also use your account and write physical paper checks.

To use this feature you visit the website and input the person or business that you want to write a check to. This includes name, amount of payment and address.

Then press send a real physical check will be sent to the business or person. This can save you money by not having to buy money orders again.

With bill pay you can save money on buying money orders. If you use direct deposit you will no longer have to pay check cashing fees.

However, we do not recommend the rush credit card. This is because they have many fees that other cards do not have.

An example is the convenience fee. This is a fee you are charged every time you use your card.

You will be charged $1.00 with a maximum charge of $10.00 a month. However during a month you will be charged $1.00 for every transaction you make using your card.

Then at the end of the month all the extra charges above 10.00 will be credited back to your account at the end of the next calendar month.

That can end up being a full 2 months before you are refunded. This is unbelievable especially because many of us use are card more than ten times in a month.

It’s hard to believe that someone can be charged these fees. In addition having to wait so long to get your refund.

Also to use bill payment you must enroll which is $2.00 then every check you write is another $1.00. There are other prepaid credit cards that offer free bill pay and no fees.

The rush card claims there are no hidden fees however that seems to be a very contradictory statement. Especially when you are forced to read the fine print to discover that you will be charged one dollar for every purchase you make.

In sum, stay away from the rush card. There are many other prepaid credit cards available that have lower fees and better benefits.

The Tribute Credit Card is a sub prime unsecured card. Often this card is used to re-establish a damaged credit score.

The First Bank of Delaware issues this card. They are a reputable sub prime lending institution.

With responsible use of your card it can help to improve your credit score. This is because with on time monthly payments you will be able to create a positive payment history on your credit report.

This factor is heavily weighted when your score is being calculated. In addition it will improve your ratio of available credit to debt. This ratio is how the bureaus decide if you are in over your head or can afford the new credit line.

You will have an annual fee with this card; this is common with bad credit cards. Your APR will be 19.50% which is the industry standard.

Your initial credit limit will be $300. Your card does have monthly credit reporting to all three major bureaus.

This card is unique because they are committed to approving most applicants. If you credit is severely damaged you can still be approved for this card, however instead of a $300 limit your card will have a $70 limit.

It will still report to the bureaus and the limit can increase to $300 with responsible use. There are no finance charges and no account set up fees.

There have easy approval requirements and no minimum income for this card. You will have free online account access and there is no application fee.

Your card will be eligible for limit increases up to a maximum of $2000. When you apply you will know if you have been approved within 30 seconds of submitting your application.

You should also know to get the most benefit on your credit with this card you should aim to keep the balance at roughly 20% of your credit limit. This will help your score because it shows you are in fact using your card and using it responsibly.

In sum if you need a second chance with credit then we do suggest the Tribute MasterCard. It can help your score by improving your available credit to debt and creating a positive payment history.