Ok so I am a recent college graduate spent 4 years in undergrad and 2 years in graduate school so needless to say I havnt really concentrated on my credit scores and such. I have recently started to rebuild my credit. I am starting a new job in febuary that will check my credit because it requires a security clearance so i have payed attention to my credit and pulled my reports. I noticed two bad accounts that are both medical one is for 7697 and the other is for 225 both stemming from the same doctor visit. The date on these accounts are from 2007 but the visit to the hospital was 2005-2006. Needless to say while in college I moved around alot and never got the bills and forgot about this whole thing until now. I did make the mistake of contacting the agency but i did not declare ownership of the accounts. I said to them that there are negatives from their agency that i would like to have removed that I had no knowledge of before I saw my credit report. I have to get this clearance and this debt stands in my way. I do not know what to do and would appreciate any advice. Have I messed up?

Bump... I didnt recieve a single phone call from the hospital or from a collection agency

I live in the state of alabama

Opt out
http://whychat.5u.com/OPTOUTINST.HTML
Try to get old addresses deleted

Send each CRA where ANY medical accounts are being reported THIS: ( follow ALL the instructions, even if they seem silly)
http://whychat.5u.com/hipaadisp.html

Thanks whychat for the response. I will do what you are telling me exactly and will respond with the results.

I opted out, do you have any advice on how to get old addresses deleted should i call the bureau, dispute online, or use snail mail. If online what site should I try. I currently use myfico score watch but I dont think I can directly dispute from there. Im guessing I have to get old addresses deleted from all bureaus?

I initially sent letters via snail mail and TU and EX deleted everything immediately. EX only deleted one address, so I called them and was able to get all but one of the bad addresses removed. If I were to do it all over again, I would have called first and sent letters later as it would have saved me almost a month.

*Note: I'm not one of the experts, just a guy trying to get his credit fixed so he can buy a house

Ok I opted out, disputed my old addresses with all three bureaus. There were a few addresses that they would not allow me to dispute. I called experian and the lady said i could not dispute because they were reported by a creditor. I know one of the addresses I unsucessfully tried to dispute is clearly incorrect and my name was mispelled two times on the reports and i disputed that.

Should I wait for a response from my address disputes before i send initial letter to cra's? What about the adresses i couldnt get deleted?

bump?

Yes, but if you can't get them deleted, don't sweat it, go ahead and send the disputes.

thanks I will wait a couple of weeks. I have 3 months to do this. Is this a reasonable time frame?

With original dates of service from 2005 and 2006 they may just come off with the Per-HIPAA dispute, but if not 3 months is more than enough time to get these taken care of, just make sure you follow through with all of the steps as instructed and ask questions (before you do something) if you are not sure.

Ok I got my first response from experian on the address disputes they only deleted a couple of addresses I still have several on there I wanted deleted. Still no response from the other two cra's. I sent the first dispute letter to experian should I wait to get word back from the other CRA's or can I go ahead and send the first letter?

bump?

If you have opted out, then yes, go ahead and send the initial dispute letter;
http://whychat.5u.com/hipaadisp.html

Thank Whychat! I hand wrote them and yellow paper hopefully this will work,

The other letters are written and ready to place in the mail tommorrow certified mail no return reciept. I will let you know what happens next month!

I got my first response letter back from experian saying that they have already investigated this information and will not re investigate. Whats next? ahhhh!

I never received a bill for this and it really makes me angry that the only way that I know how much I owe is seeing it on my credit report. I wasnt contacted by mail or phone and they had the information at the time. I would love to make payments to the OC and get this off of my report maybe even see an itemized statement of what I was actually billed for.......

bump

Wait until you get a response from the other 2 bureaus, then send the reporting CA this;
http://whychat.5u.com/ltrcavalhipaa.html

You need to wait for the other 2 because THEY may delete the account. You need to send the reporting CA the SAME letter for EACH CRA that has not deleted, ( in the same CMRR envelope) as you THEN, as soon as you have the green card back need to send each CRA this;
http://whychat.5u.com/ltrcavalhipaa.html#DISPUTE

It is also possible that your response from Experian is a "quicky" automated response. The timing so soon after you sent the initial dispute letter is rather rapid for a normal reply. DO NOT CONTACT Experian on this issue as it will add 15 days to your dispute IF, as is possible the letter you received was not the "real" response but a stopgap automated reply. ( Presuming you followed the instructions about not typing the initial dispute in a scanable font).

I thought it was strange that I got a response 5 days after i mailed the initial dispute. It was handwritten so it really surprised me. I wil wait it our and continue with the process. Thanks whychat I appreciate your advise.