How to Remove Negative Items From Your Credit Report

Anything negative that shows up on your credit report — missed payments, big balances, debts turned over to collection agencies, bankruptcies – is … well, undesirable.

It can undo the good financial steps you have taken – on-time payments, balances under 30% of credit limit, appropriate use and mix of credit accounts — and tank your credit score.

For that reason, you should be vigilant about checking your credit report for accuracy – for any negative item that doesn’t belong – because errors happen more often than you might think. A 2024 study by Consumer Reports and WorkMoney found mistakes on about half of credit reports in the survey, with more than 25% involving the kind of negative items that can significantly lower a credit score.

If a negative item is on your credit report and shouldn’t be, you should try to get it removed. It won’t be fun and it won’t be easy, but it’s well worth doing for the sake of your financial health. Read on as we walk you through the process.

What Counts as a Negative Item on Your Credit Report?

Regularly checking your credit report is Step No. 1 in this operation. The easiest way to get your report is to use AnnualCreditReport.com, which is authorized under federal law to provide free weekly reports online from the three major credit reporting bureaus (Equifax, Experian and TransUnion).

Once you have your credit report in front of you, here are the negative items for which to look:

• Late payments. Any unpaid bill more than 30 days overdue.
• Collections. A debt that has been turned over to a collection agency.
• Charge-offs. A debt your creditor has declared likely to be uncollectible.
• Bankruptcies. Your formal court filings for relief from debt you can’t repay.
• Hard inquiries. Requests from potential lenders to view your credit report so they can assess your financial reliability after you’ve applied for a loan, a credit card or other line of credit.

Any and all of those items can appear on your credit report. When they do, they signal to lenders that you might be a risk, and your creditworthiness takes a hit as a result. Those negatives can make it more difficult for you to get better terms on a new loan (or get the new loan at all) and could get in the way of a job application or approval for a lease. When you see them on your credit report, make sure they’re legitimate.

You might also notice inaccuracies in the personal information on your credit report, such as incorrect or outdated employment status, a wrong address, or even a misspelled name. You should notify the credit bureaus about those mistakes so they can be corrected, but those inaccuracies don’t affect your credit and so aren’t considered negative items.

Can You Really Remove Negative Items from Your Credit Report?

Yes, you can get negative items removed from your credit report if you can prove the items are incorrect. When you file a dispute and can back it up, the credit bureaus are required to investigate and remove any false information.

But no, you can’t remove negative items if those missed payments, bankruptcies, and other unfavorable developments really happened. When the negative info is accurate, it stays on your credit report for a set time – usually at least 7 years — whether you file a dispute or not.

Your formal dispute will start with the credit bureau whose report included the negative item or items. If you see the mistake on one bureau’s report, you should check the other two in case it shows up on them as well. You’ll need to file a separate dispute with each bureau that is reporting the inaccuracy.

Once the reporting bureau has your dispute, it might ask you to contact the specific creditor or debt collector about the information you claim is wrong. That isn’t a bad idea because it’s possible you can get the mistake corrected at that level, or you might learn information that buttresses your case with the reporting bureau.

If it feels like you’re doing all the work, be aware that your own reach-out to the creditor doesn’t release the reporting bureau from its legal obligation to investigate your dispute.

While you are fighting the dispute, watch out for marketing claims from companies that promise to get negative items removed from your credit report even when the information is accurate. Their “guarantees” most likely are credit repair scams that will involve hefty up-front fees for which you’ll receive nothing, and might be insidious efforts to steal your identity.

Remember, accurate information can’t be legally removed from your credit report regardless of what the scammers tell you.

When Negative Items Can Be Removed Early

As we’ve mentioned, negative items that are accurate stay on your credit report for at least 7 years. But when you file a dispute, the credit bureau has to be able to verify the accuracy of a negative item with the creditor who opened the account for you. If it can’t be verified, the item can be removed from your credit report.

If, for example, your credit report indicates you’ve been late with your payments on a loan and you can prove you’ve been prompt with them, you should be able to get that negative item removed in reasonably short order.

The same is true about a balance on one of your accounts. If it’s reported as large and close to the limit of your credit when in fact you’ve kept your credit utilization ratio under control (less than 30%), dispute it. Accounts that are reported as open when they’ve been closed or closed when they’re still open can also be removed early with a formal dispute and the right documentation.

On occasion, an account in arrears shows up on a credit report in multiple places. Maybe a debt was sold and both the original creditor and the collector to whom it was sold both report it. That ain’t good; you should dispute it. Or it’s possible you lost a credit card and closed the account when a new card was issued, but the old account continues to show up on your credit report with a balance along with the new one. Also, not good.

Sometimes, however, these duplicate reporting scenarios are simply clerical errors, but they can lower your credit score unfairly. That’s another reason to check your credit report regularly and carefully, because they can be removed with a dispute.

And, certainly, when the inaccuracies you see on your credit report suggest that your identity might have been stolen, don’t hesitate to get that information removed. If someone has used your credit card or bank account number to make purchases or open new accounts, he or she isn’t going to pay those bills. Instead, those amounts show up on your credit report as unpaid. That’s your call to action, starting with a report filed to IdentityTheft.gov which then becomes part of the documentation you include with your dispute to the credit bureaus. It’s smart to keep abreast of available identity theft tips involving all of your accounts.

Pay attention to how long a negative item has been lingering on your report. The Fair Credit Reporting Act mandates that most negative items must be removed after 7 years (some bankruptcies can appear for 10 years), but mistakes occasionally are made. If something has appeared on your report for more than 7 years, it’s probably outdated information and can be removed. In the case of hard inquiries, they shouldn’t appear on your report for more than 2 years.

How to Dispute Negative Items on Your Credit Report

Once you’ve identified an error in your credit report, you have several options for how to dispute it. All three credit bureaus offer an online dispute form at their websites, and each website also includes a phone number through which you can register your dispute.

Be aware, though, that an online or telephone filing might limit the number of documents you can include as evidence of the error, so you might be wise to consider a third, more reliable, method: sending a dispute letter, along with copies of your evidence, to the bureau (or bureaus) via certified mail. A hint: If you use mail, be sure to keep a record and copies of everything you send and spend the nominal amount it takes to get a return receipt, so you know the credit bureau received the letter. Filing the dispute itself is free. There is no charge.

Whichever filing method you intend to use, be as prepared as you can be to make a convincing case before you begin the process. You’ll have to explain either in writing, on an online form, or in a phone conversation exactly why your credit report is in error and how you can prove it. Have that information in place ahead of your contact with the reporting bureau.

You’ll also need to provide your name and address, an itemized list of each mistake you want corrected, a copy of the credit report that contains the disputed items, and copies of the documents you’ve collected as evidence. The key word there is copies. Don’t give the bureaus the originals!

Depending on the nature of the negative item or items you’re disputing, the documents you might need can be:

• A police report or Federal Trade Commission identity theft report that proves a fraud
• A letter from a specific creditor indicating corrections already made that aren’t showing up on your credit report
• Name change documents, marriage or death certificates, a bankruptcy schedule, student loan disability letters
• Bank statements and utility bills that might prove a late payment mark is in error
• Canceled checks

It’s possible a decision on your dispute could be made within a day of when you filed it. In any case, though, the Fair Credit Reporting Act mandates that the reporting bureau has 30 days to complete an investigation into your dispute and must send you a notice in writing of its determination within five business days after it makes its decision.

That decision could result in:

• Removal of the item from your credit report. (Yay!)
• Corrected information about balances or late payments. (Yay!)
• Verification that the negative item in dispute is accurate. (Boo!)
• Updates to items involving old, unpaid, or closed collection accounts. (OK)

If you aren’t happy with the decision and still believe you’re in the right, you can add a short (100-word) dispute statement to your credit report that explains your side of the story to potential future lenders.

To dispute a negative item with an individual creditor (which the reporting bureau might ask you to do) or to dispute debt collections, use the same general preparation, document-gathering, and filing process that you do with a reporting bureau. If you win the dispute with a creditor, it must update or remove the error from its records and formally notify the reporting bureaus to which it gave the bad information.

What Happens If a Negative Item Is Accurate?

When the investigation that your dispute set in motion ends in a decision that the negative item is accurate, the dispute will be closed, and the negative item will stay on your credit report.

That will be true even if the debt was paid at some point after the negative item originally appeared on your report. The report might be updated with a note that it has been paid in full or settled.

The bottom line: You’ll be stuck waiting out the credit bureaus’ looooooong reporting timelines for negative items.

How long is looooooong? In most cases, it’s 7 years.

• Late payments and missed payments? 7 years from the time they first became delinquent, even if you pay the past-due balance before then.
• A foreclosure? 7 years.
• A debt turned over to a collection agency? 7 years.
• A debt that has been charged-off? 7 years.
• A Chapter 13 bankruptcy? 7 years.
• A repossession? Up to 7 years.

It can be worse than that, too. A Chapter 7 bankruptcy shows up on your credit report for 10 years.

Hard inquiries, on the other hand, appear for only 2 years, and they only affect your credit score for 1 year.

That’s if your negative item is accurate or if your dispute of it is unsuccessful. However, you still have a couple of strategies that might ameliorate the effect on your credit. We mentioned earlier that you can add a short statement to your credit report explaining your issue with a negative item. You can also send a ‘goodwill deletion’ letter to a creditor or try to negotiate a pay-for-delete agreement.

A goodwill deletion letter explains why you missed payments, what you’ve already done to try to get the account straightened out, and – if applicable – how the negative item is creating a hardship for you. Essentially, you throw yourself on the mercy of the creditor and hope you get a sympathetic ear. The creditor, of course, is under no obligation to cut you any slack, but who knows? You might get lucky.

A pay-for-delete agreement is an arrangement in which you promise to pay off some or all of your overdue debt in exchange for the creditor or debt collector removing the negative item from your credit report. There are no guarantees it will work, either, but trying to negotiate with your creditor is an option, at least, when your credit score is underwater.

Which brings us to one more strategy. You can, and should, be doing everything you in your power to rebuild credit during the looooooong shelf-life of a negative item on your credit report.

How to rebuild credit? Among the ways to improve your credit score under the cloud of a negative item are being on time with your current bill payments, using a secured or retail credit card, finding a cosigner for a new loan if you’ve been rejected on your own, and taking out a credit builder loan or secured loan and staying current with those payments.

Common Mistakes to Avoid When Trying to Delete Negative Items

Carelessness can cost you, so be thorough. Obviously, it’s important that your dispute includes all the required information. That means:

• Your contact information
• The credit report confirmation number
• The error or errors you want corrected, along with the identifying numbers for the accounts in question
• A well-thought-out explanation that makes your case
• A specific request that the bad information be removed or corrected
• A copy of your credit report, with the disputed item clearly marked
• Copies of any documents you’ve gathered to prove the credit report is wrong

You might be tempted to file a dispute in a ‘Hail Mary’ effort to save your credit. But it isn’t a good idea to file a frivolous dispute about an accurate negative item, one you know doesn’t have much of a chance to succeed. Your dispute will be denied, probably quickly, and it might backfire in a way that further damages your credit.

For example, an investigation set in motion by a longshot dispute about a debt that has been turned over to a collection agency could turn up even more recent negative activity about the collection efforts. So, be careful.

And it’s really not a good idea to file a dispute about an accurate item over and over and over again, when each of them is very likely to be unsuccessful. To the credit bureaus, you can start to sound like the boy who cried wolf, meaning they might not be inclined to take you seriously if you bring up more legitimate credit-related issues in the future.

Too, you need to understand the difference between the credit bureau’s reporting timeline (usually 7 years) and the statute of limitations on how long your creditors have to take legal action against you over the debt. They aren’t the same.

As we’ve mentioned, an unpaid debt should disappear from your credit report after seven years even if the debt is sold to a new collection agency during that timeframe.

The statute of limitations on collections can range from 3-10 years, depending on where you accrued the debt and what kind of debt it is. That means it’s possible a creditor or collector could sue you for it during the years it’s also weighing down your credit report.

The statute of limitations could expire before the 7-year credit report time is up, but if you aren’t careful, it could also be extended or renewed to last even longer. If it’s old debt and sometime during the statute of limitations period you make a partial payment on it in the hope it could ease the credit report burden, you might inadvertently re-set the statute of limitations clock back to zero, extending the length of time you’ll be vulnerable to a lawsuit. Why? Because in the eyes of the law, you’ve acknowledged that you, in fact, owe the debt.

On the other hand, if you dispute a debt that has been turned over to a collection agency, the agency isn’t allowed to contact you about its collection effort until it provides documented verification of the debt. In that case, then, the statute of limitations clock is paused. Bottom line: It’s easy to get confused about the ramifications.

And don’t make the mistake of falling for a paid deletion scam. You might be tempted by a fraudulent offer to remove accurate negative items from your credit report in exchange for an upfront fee. Resist! Don’t listen to guarantees or suggestions that you use a Credit Privacy Number (CPN) to get it done. Legitimate agencies can’t remove accurate negative information. You’ll be out the upfront fee you paid with nothing to show for it.

Remember, you can dispute a negative item yourself, for free.

How Credit Counseling Can Help with Credit Report Issues

Nonprofit credit counseling agencies can help you understand the nuances of your credit report, advise you about disputes and how to prioritize them, and plan for what comes next.

Counselors at nonprofit agencies are trained and certified in the areas of budgeting, consumer credit, money, and debt management. Initial counseling sessions can be done over the phone, in person, or online, and are free. A nonprofit agency will charge a nominal fee if you choose to enroll in one of its debt management plans.

A for-profit credit counseling agency might cost anywhere from $50-$200 a month to address negative items on your credit report, for services that could include confirming that your report includes an error or errors, filing a dispute on your behalf and writing a goodwill letter for you.

Any reputable credit counseling agency shouldn’t make pie-in-the-sky guarantees that it will remove negative items from your report if they are accurate, but it will offer the sort of financial education that can start you on the way to rebuilding your credit during the time a negative item is affecting your credit score. If you need one, nonprofit credit counselors will help you identify and undertake the debt relief program that best suits your financial situation, as they are required by law to do.

Monitoring Your Credit After Disputes

You’ll want to know the status of your dispute after you file it, of course. During the investigation, the credit bureaus should add a notice to your credit report that identifies the negative item in question and that you are disputing it. If your dispute is successful, make sure to monitor the report going forward to confirm the error has been corrected.

You discovered the mistake in the first place because you smartly checked your credit report. Let that be a lesson to continue to do it. You can get your report weekly for free from AnnualCreditReport.com, although those reports usually don’t include your credit score. The credit reports you can request from the individual credit reporting bureaus (TransUnion, Experian, and Equifax) will include your credit score. They’re required by federal law to provide a free report to you once every 12 months.

Take advantage of all that access and regularly look over your credit report to make sure it’s accurate. Your credit monitoring should include checks for re-reporting of duplicate accounts, identity theft, or any new errors that might affect your credit score.

Monitoring your credit report is a great way to keep track of your financial health. If your credit score isn’t where you’d like it to be, your report will provide a road map to recovery. Staying on top of it will reinforce the good credit habits that improve your eligibility for better loan terms, position you for better jobs, increase your chances to be approved for a new apartment, and more.

Frequently Asked Questions About Removing Negative Credit Report Items

How do I find a negative item on my credit report?

A negative item won’t be explicitly labeled “Negative Item,” so look for phrases such as “Late” or “30 Days Past Due” or “Collection” or “Charge-Off” or “Bankruptcy.” Usually, they’re in the Account History or Public Records sections of a credit report and are identified as derogatory marks. (There could be a section actually called ‘Derogatory Marks.’) In the case of late payments, a negative item will be listed under the specific account.

Do I have any recourse if I don’t agree with the outcome of my dispute?

Yes, several, but there are no guarantees. You can submit a new dispute, though you should only try if you can include new evidence in support of your case. You can try pleading your case by letter to an officer in the company (such as a credit card company) that informed the credit reporting bureaus about the negative item. You can file a complaint with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, though its status is unclear in the wake of the Trump Administration’s efforts to dismantle it. You can file a complaint with your state’s attorney general. And you can attach a 100-word statement to your credit report that presents your side of the story about the negative item in question; your statement will be visible to lenders.

Will filing a dispute lower my credit score?

The act itself of filing the dispute will have no impact on your credit score, nor will your credit score change simply because your dispute was unsuccessful. Your score will only change for the worse if the investigation that stemmed from the dispute uncovers new negative information such as more recent activity around a debt collection effort.

If I win my dispute and a negative item is removed, how long will it take for my credit score to improve? And how much will it improve?

It could take a few days to a few weeks for your credit report to reflect the change, but when it does, your score could improve by as much as 50-100 points. If it’s been a matter of months and the correction (and subsequent impact on your credit score) hasn’t appeared on your credit report, get back in touch with both the reporting bureau and the specific creditor associated with the negative item and ask them what’s up.

Do I have to file a separate dispute for every error I want to fix on my credit report?

No. As long as you provide an explanation and the appropriate documentation for each issue that concerns you, you can request that they all be addressed in one dispute.