Credit Report

[arlington]

I had my 341 towards the end of last year and have officially been confirmed. Should I start trying to clean up my credit report now or wait until I am discharged? If I should start now what exactly should I be looking for?

[HHM]

Yes, you should start. But just be ready for it to be a fight on some items.

But as for what to shoot for, as with any BK, you want all accounts to reflect IIB (included in bankruptcy) and show a zero balance owed. What else you need to do depends on what is already on the report.

[dovette7]

Question on the credit report. CITI shows up on mine as a charge off. I had 3 accounts with them, they did not file claims in my Chapter 13. So b/c they did not, is it still a charge off, or should it read included in bankruptcy?
Thanks

[EveryDayAdam]

ALL accounts that you listed on your BK petition, whether they filed claims or not, should be listed as included in BK with a $0 balance.

[Flamingo]

After going tbrough all this during my Chapter 13, it is probably best to wait a bit (several months or so after your confirmation) so things can adjust on your reports. If you start too early, you will find that they may change the information after your initial or first few disputes, but it may revert back to old information when tapes are updated. You will find you will be cleaning them up yearly - during our third year of Chapter 13, many creditors started to indicate we filed a Chapter 7 instead of a Chapter 13. Where that information came from, I don't know and I had to send in copies of documents to clear that up. Just do not be in a hurry - you will not need a clean credit file during your years in the Plan; after your discharge is when you should become extremely agressive as to cleaning up your reports. Some creditors make it difficult; as in our situation, while they are listing us correctly many have put in dates beyond our discharge (8/30/06) stating "Date First Major Delinquence was Reported." It's their sneaky way of having that BK stay beyond the seven year take off mark. We are almost two years past our discharge and our 13 will start coming off in the spring of 2009 but we are still fighting with problems that seem to come out of nowhere on cleaned up accounts.

[krielly]

We're halfway through our 13, and I recently obtained all 3 credit reports. I noticed also that some of the creditors have our "last date of delinquency" as dated after we filed.....in some cases MONTHS after we filed.
I assume those need to be removed.........? I don't believe I was late on ANYTHING at the time of filing.

[car67]

I think I will start on the plan of clean up when I know I have 18 months left in my plan. Until then not much you can do ?