How do I get rid of inquiries on my credit report

by Thomas Vargo

Each time you apply for credit and the creditor checks your credit report, a credit inquiry is added to your file. This also applies to credit offers received in the mail and in which you have responded.

All credit inquiries are supposed to come off your credit report after two years. However, you may take these steps to try to get them off sooner.

First, find the credit inquiries that are hurting your credit. Order all three of your credit reports. Then, take a look at the end of your credit report files to find the inquiries. There may be some inquiries that are promotional ones and will not be shown to creditors. You do not need to worry about them. Only find the inquiries that are shown to creditor. They will be the ones where you have applied for credit, but some others may seem to be completely unknown to you.

Second, find the addresses for each credit inquirer. If the addresses are not on your credit reports, you may need to call them or visit their website.

Third, prepare letters to be sent to each inquiring creditor asking them to remove the inquiry they have made. The Fair Credit Reporting Act allows only authorized inquiries to appear on your credit report. You must write a letter challenging and disputing that the creditor had authorization to pull your credit report.

Finally, send the letters Certified Mail Return Receipt Requested and keep a copy of each letter sent.

The main objective of these letters is to get the creditors to simply agree to removing the inquiries, because they don't want to take the time to verify that you have authorized them to pull your credit report.