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A successful credit dispute letter can remove negative credit items from your credit report and increase your overall credit score quickly. In fact, when you talk to a credit counselor about boosting your credit scores, often the first thing he’ll do is look over your report for things he can write a dispute letter about and get removed. This is the fastest, easiest, and most effective legal way to raise your credit score.

Writing a successful credit dispute letter is a matter of knowing what to say, how to say it, and who to send it to. It’s easy and you don’t need a credit professional to do it for you. A better credit score means big savings in interest rates, monthly payments, and better offers of credit from lenders. So it’s important that you do everything you can to boost your credit score and credit dispute letters are the fastest way to do that.

First of all, the generic dispute letters offered on many websites (for a fee) are not usually effective. That is because the people at the credit bureaus see these so often that they consider them to be no better than the spam you delete from your email. They usually do not respond well to these generic letters.

What you need is a custom-written document that clearly states your case in as few words as possible, gives all the pertinent details about your case, and still retains a “human” quality to it. The letter you’re writing is going to the credit bureau, not the creditor, so commenting on the company’s falsehoods or wrongdoings is not at issue here (unless it helps to cite specific breaches of contract or the law). Any documentation that backs up your claims should also be cited and included (copies, of course, never send originals).

One more caveat to remember: don’t quote the law, the person reading your letter is familiar with the law and will know if the accused creditor has broken it or not. This is important because when you quote the law, you give a tone of “talking down” to the person reading. You don’t want that, you want them to be on your side, so don’t make them feel belittled. Instead, mention the law or paraphrase important bits, but do not include a whole quotation in your letter (or even a partial, just mention it).

Now that you know what is entailed in a successful credit dispute letter, let’s look at how it should be written. Write the letter in business format (Their address/contact info at top, the date, a salutation like “Dear Sir,” or “To so-and-so” and your letter written in block paragraph form (spaces between paragraphs, no indents). At the bottom, tab over twice, input “Sincerely,” and hit enter at least twice to create a space. Then under that (two more tabs), put your name. Then, aligned left, put your name again, address, telephone, and other contact information. Sign the letter in the empty space between the “Sincerely,” and your typed name.

The tone of the letter itself should be personal: talk about you and them as if you were personal friends. Try not to sound angry, but sounding somewhat upset is OK if it helps your cause. Use words like “I” and “we” and “you” and “they” often. This personal writing is more likely to appeal to the reader on a personal level and makes you into a real, live, human being rather than just a bunch of words on paper.

Finally, send the letter with some kind of guaranteed postage where you get a notification of delivery, such as delivery confirmation, tracking information, or a return signature card. This is your legal proof that the letter was sent and could be useful later. You might as well learn how to consolidate three dispute letters if you sent more than one. It’s also how you prove that they did or did not respond in a timely manner, as there are specific state and federal laws regarding how much time they are allowed to take to answer your dispute. If they go over that time, you may have the right to have the dispute declared in your favor and removed from your credit report or noted in your credit cards statements.

All in all, you can probably see why those generic letters offered on those websites probably won’t work. Obviously there are a lot of things they can’t cover that you can if you personalize your credit dispute letter. So sit down and write it and get your credit restored!

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