Disputing Credit Errors Is Now Easier Than Ever

You can now dispute errors on your credit report online through Credit Karma's Direct Dispute.
By Nicholas Pell ,

Approximately 20% of Americans have mistakes on their credit reports. Pulling your credit report is now easier than ever, but disputing incorrect charges has lagged behind. Most people don't know how to dispute charges and the process can be difficult and complicated -- until now.

Credit Karma, the same company that allows you to track two of your three credit reports in what effectively amounts to real time, are now making disputing credit report errors easier than ever. The company has launched a Direct Dispute feature that lets users dispute their credit reports directly from the Credit Karma platform.

In the initial rollout, Direct Deposit helped over 600,000 users resolve their disputes. The median time for resolution was a mere five days. Using the old fashioned method of dispute resolution, it might take five days for the creditor and credit bureau even to receive your complaint.

Anthony Lingen, product manager at Credit Karma, notes that the two most common errors are mistaken or fraudulent accounts and incorrect account details. "Credit reports sometimes mistakenly have accounts that don't belong to you," he says. That can happen because you have a similar name as someone or live at the same address. Additionally, "your credit report might have clerical errors or might be missing details like your credit limit or accounts responsibility," he says.

Filing a single dispute will take care of any errors across multiple credit bureaus. According to Lingen, TransUnion is notified directly. From there, an assessment is made before the dispute is forwarded for further investigation to any relevant institutions and agencies. "If the review results in an update to the disputed report, the company that provided the information is required to notify other credit bureaus," Lingen says.

Lingen says that according to the Federal Trade Commission, about 25% of Americans have errors on their credit report that can impact their scores. About 5% of all Americans have an error impacting their score by over 25 points, with about 1 in 250 consumers having their score impacted by 100 points.

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