Monitor Your Bank Accounts

Identity theft is a major contributor to damaging your credit. What makes the problem far worse is that you will spend countless hours collecting evidence and correcting your credit report that might have been spent productively. There are, however, a few simple things you can do to help nip identity theft in the bud.

One is to monitor your bank accounts by phone or through the online services provided by your bank. Monitoring your bank accounts requires that you invest a few minutes two to three times each week that will potentially save you untold hours fixing a problem after the fact. The first step is to choose a bank that offers either online monitoring of your account or telephone monitoring of your account--or both. If the bank does not offer either that bank is living in the stone ages and should be avoided.

Once you choose a bank that offers these services, you must be willing to invest a few minutes every few days to look for checks or debit card transactions that appear to be questionable. It helps, of course, when you are monitoring your account to keep an accurate record of each and every check written or debit card transaction you made. Accurate records will allow you to check the bank's records to see if they match your own. In checking your transactions you must take into account those checks written that have not yet cleared.

If you do this your account balance and your bank's records should reflect the same figure. When you are monitoring your account you must look for any transaction that is questionable or unrecognized. Identity theft is not the only reason that a transaction is not recognized. Banks make errors from time to time. If you think your bank made an error or if there are transactions that you do not recognize or cannot otherwise account for, call your bank's customer service department immediately and start an investigation.

It is to your benefit to do so--even if the mistake is in your favor. You put the bank on notice that your identity might have been stolen and you set the wheels in motion to correct any bank error that occurred. Remember, a bank error in your favor is not a gift to you. If you discover that your identity has been stolen take all of the proper steps to fix the problem. The earlier you are able to intervene on your behalf the easier it will be to correct the problem.

Ordering your credit report is actually easy and secure on-line. Contrary to popular belief ordering your own credit report does not affect your credit score. Once you have pulled your report print it out and highlight all information that is incorrect. Make sure you understand everything on it. The current law states that negative information will stay on your credit report for 7-10 years from collection date.

The expiration date will vary depending on the type of collection. When you pay off a collection that does not mean it will be removed from your report. Examine your report and determine when each collection is set to expire. Once these collections are set to expire you will see major improvement to your score.

If you find inaccurate information such as, fraudulent information, collections that expired still reporting, you have the right to dispute. You will have to dispute each of the 3 credit bureaus separately, Equifax, Experian and TransUnion.Once you the bureaus have received your dispute they have 30 days to determine whether they will update information requested.

Don't dispute good credit on your report, accurate information cannot be removed from your credit report and is a waste of time. Disputing accurate information could harm your credit. Now that you have disputed information that is not correct and have hopefully got it removed or update you can begin to add positive credit to your report. The quickest way to do this is to get a Orchard bank secured credit card.

This credit card is designed to rebuild credit even for people that just got out of a bankruptcy. Make sure you use this card responsibly. Also avoid going applying for to lots of credit, you really need a couple of secured credit cards to start establishing good credit. It is very simple to monitor your progress of increasing your creditworthiness these days with credit report monitoring services. You can sign up for credit reporting monitoring services that will allow you to monitor your credit score, get key changes e-mailed to you, along with access to your credit report. Your credit score will improve over time as you add positive information to your report.