Most laws dealing with credit reports, credit and collections are federal consumer laws designed to protect consumers from fraud and abuse. Under the FCRA or fair reporting act information on trade lines which are older than 7 years can be disputed and removed, particularly if the information is inaccurate or derogatory.

The Truth in Lending Act and Fair Credit Billing Act protect consumers from undisclosed fees or unfair billing practices. The FCRA law only permits bankruptcy information to appear on the credit reports for 10 years and requires this information to be accurate. Each negative item on a report must be accurate and you have a right to verify its accuracy.

This includes late payments, repossessions, collection accounts, charge offs, profit and loss write-offs, settlements, judgments, legal actions or lawsuits and related matters which may appear on your credit repair report. Before you send your most private personal financial information to some "company" without knowing who you are dealing with, you should be forewarned that only a law firm can provide the protections of attorney client privilege and can take legal action in the form of a lawsuit to protect your interests.

Many firms are not representing your best interests and are not governed by the same code of conduct that attorneys are governed by. All of the consumer protections available to you are in the form of very complicated laws and regulations, which have even more complicated interpretations. Trusting legal matters to lawyers is the best course when handling these types of disputes. Learning the basics of this process will help. But the actual actions taken to clear up the problems many times require knowledge of the law at a quick pace. An attorney can help with this need for quick pace and effectiveness. Try to keep calm during the system. We know that this is a sensitive set of items, but rest assured, the attorney client privilege is golden.