It is so easy to verify a bankruptcy. I just signed on to a website that shall remain nameless (in case some CA or CRA doesn't know about it) and within two minutes was able to search for BK by last name and found my Dad's from like 1990.....
Finding an online record verifies the truth of a BK how? I found an online record that a UFO landed in Roswell. BKs get removed all the time.
PAE, You're exactly right...there is an online system (and it is no secret to the credit industry) which has the same name as an old AMC car...lol. All bk filings are a matter of public record along with all the schedules which delineate all of your income and expenses et al. What is more difficult to find out is what happens to each filing...what motions are filed, if any, and if the bk was confirmed and when etc.. But the filing in and of itself gives more info than one usually likes to be displayed publicly. clc
Omega, Your post says that BKs get removed all the time. I am guessing you mean from credit files? If so, could you tell me your experience or where to find info on the technique used to remove a BK? Was it using the dispute process with the CRA's or attacking the items one at a time? I would like to know more about how this works... Thanks
Certainly. Here is a reply to a freebie client I have been helping. This should get you on the right track. Person got a BK, and wants to dispute it. They are going to try to get the addy attached to the item removed from the reports first, then hit the BK it's self later. Now my reply was the following: quote: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The address ploy is a good one. Softening the report by getting old info off of it is always a good first string tactic, but it has limits, as I will explain. Get the connected addy removed and there is less "matching" material, linking you to the BK, though, you are quite correct. Let's have a quick look at how matching factors work for the CRAs, and how a legitimate problem could come up. For example, let's say my name is John Davis. Very common. Do a search for "John Davis" in quotes, on www.google.com , and you get 87,200 returns, and none of those guys is me! The unfortunate thing about that is, when they get a report of a bad item for a random John Davis, I MAY have matching factors that cause it to be placed falsly in my file. (Thank God I don't live on "Main Street"!) The more matching factors, the harder it is to remove. So you can see that getting the matching addy out of the files is a step in the right direction. But the public record may have been reported with a middle initial, or a soc number, etc. There may be more than one "matching factor" linking the BK to you in this case. But it never hurts to stack the deck in your favor, pre-game, as it were. Also, do not attempt to dispute the BK until after all of the "included in BK" items have fallen off. It is too easy to verify the BK (and its undisputable connection to you) by calling one of the creditors that got burned in the BK, then the item appears at "Bankruptcy Verified such and such a date". Well, a verified entry on a BK is worse than a regular BK, because it tells them in future disputes, that they have looked into it before. (You can still get it off though...it just makes it harder.) If it will be years before the included in BK items fall off, dispute them first and get those completely out of the way. Otherwise you will be spinning your wheels. Let me know how it goes, and good luck to you. Sincerely, John Davis number 87,201 For a good article on the topic of matching factors, and how they affect CRAs and ultimately you, check out http://www.bankrate.com/hch/news/pf/20010228a.asp (Us Davis guys take it tough!) And if you would like the viewpoint of a credit industry shill, check out the following: http://www.dca.org/resources/rs_crissues.htm#1 **************** end email ****************** Also guys, if you "live" in New York, negative items fall off inside of 5 years by law. So....if you happened to have a pen pal.... you could shave 5 years off of your "time" with some creative bi-location. Once the "included in BK" items are toast, and you have that matching address out of the way, that BK is a sitting duck. But...that would be dishonest. **heh** In any event, I removed the BK from my own reports inside of two years from ground zero. Now I do it for others. I don't care how easy it is to verify. It is also a statistical fact that one in three disputes goes your way. Lazy people work at the CRAs. Mistakes happen. There is no end of reasons why a dispute works. But it can't work if you don't dispute.
Here is a thread from the forums at creditmania.com where I posted some "hard core" and "risky" ways to wade into BK battle.... Omega_Prime Junior Member USA 104 Posts Posted - 08/18/2002 : 11:42:27 PM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- **nod** Okay, fair enough. I don't think I was bragging, and I have picked up some GREAT stuff right here on this site for the past two days. I am hoping to get a clearer picture of the mechanics of the C&D letters with collections pirates. Let me preface by saying, Moderators, if you find this post crosses the line of what you do here, please delete the post and not the user! (me) WARNING!!! Getting greedy with these methods will land you in jail. This is for educational review only and the author under no circumstanses advises that you try any of this! It is illegal and could result in multiple counts of fraud, and forgery. Okay, each situation is different, but I have noticed that there is an art to disputing with the bureaus...that is...creative lying, to fit the REAL documents you already have. This is the lightest level of what I would consider "illegal credit repair". Let's make up an example, as there is no way I could cover every situation in a post. Let's say you filed a BK, and one of your creditor's showed up to broker a deal. Then the judge issues a "stay of protection" on your BK for that one item. It would be in your BK files. Now, the doc in this example is real, but there are several ways you could "explain" it when you send a copy to the bureaus. You could black out sections to "protect your privacy" and say that while you TRIED to file, you were not allowed to. Or, you could say that you brokered deals with all the "included in BK" people, but this is the only one you could find. Now, you will get some purchase with this method of "stretching the explanation" but method 2 would get you even further in this case....You will have to find your own story here, but any doc can be used to support more than one version of the truth. Method 2 would be to alter real docs you already have. This is called document tampering, and is a felony. In the above example, you would take the single settlement order, and copy it, making one for each creditor you had. White out is easy to mask in copies. Now the story you tell, being for the most part the same, has more docs to back it up. Still....often people don't have a document that lends it's self to such manipulation....so we introduce method 3. Method 3 (forgery) costs some money to set up. The more you spend the better your product becomes. Minimum, $200. You are going to get a bunch of rubber stamps that say things like "FILED" "CLOSED" "PAID IN FULL" etc, etc...you get the idea....they even make kits so you can make your own stamps at home...just in case you needed a special one that the vendors would not be likely to ship to a home address...like court seals...etc. Well, now your options are so legion that I don't know where to start. Get a letterhead from a Collection Pirate, type your own letter to yourself, the stamp it "paid in full". Vacate your own judgements, release yourself from bankruptcy...the sky is the limit. If you want to play this game and get away with it, let me suggest a couple of books: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/t...f=sr_8_2/103-9594178-7583061?s=books&n=507846 and: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1559501553/ref=pd_sim_books/103-9594178-7583061 Also, this third book is a great resource for any forger: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0124454909/ref=pd_sim_books/103-9594178-7583061 Now if you want to go all out, you can get a Fargo card printer, and a copy of Paint Shop Pro and go to town. Let's say I was working on your friend's project, Horseymen, I would try to set up a false residence in New York five years out from ground zero, based on the new info I got here, and see if I had yet another effective tool. You would have to have a friend or penpal there, and get their permission to use thier addy. Have all credit accounts sent to the new addy, but have the mail forwarded to his real house. Now, the credit bureaus will think he is in New York. Stay there for a quarter so the "included in BK" stuff comes off. Once they are gone, that BK melts like butter without forgery. Once the included in BK crap falls off, he can "move back" to his real house. I would give it a full quarter though, just to make sure it sticks. He may have to stay there for two years to keep it from coming back. This is new territory, but you see how keeping your eyes open, can open up some areas to explore. I often use the fake addy scheme to move a client to Atlanta or some such, if he has a local branch of one of the big thee that stops playing ball. That pulls him out of the local branch's jurisdiction and often they will see the resistance drop back to pre-dispute levels. Okay, that should be enough to get you started or arrested. horseymen Starting Member 9 Posts Posted - 08/19/2002 : 12:21:34 AM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Wow -- that's pretty hardcore, but I appreciate the indepth answer. I was hoping for I guess what "creditman" called the "tradelines." For chargeoffs.. I've found four Not yours, not late, paid in full and incorrect balance. But for bankruptcy, I've only found one dispute.. Not yours. I was hoping you would have more tradelines or things to try before it got THERE. But that is quite the creative thinking.. Although I might not use those or my friend, those are some very creative ways that might help me think of more tradelines to use if you don't have any. Are there any more tradelines to Chargeoffs? My theory is that some 8 dollar an hour employee opens the letter, inputs the account number into a computer system and it's all automated. letter comes back, verified, letter doesn't come back, disputed.. and the key is to keep 'valid disputes' going in as long as you can until someone doesn't answer. Maybe you have more insight on this than I do.. but usually if you repeat the same reason, they'll put a block on your account faster than anything. Omega_Prime Junior Member USA 104 Posts Posted - 08/19/2002 : 12:49:34 AM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I am not sure what a "trade line" is, but if you mean "dispute templates" for writing letters, I think they are what cause people the most frustration. Think of this as a cross between a Zen meditation and a drinking game. I often meet with the client over a few beers, and we go over his latest "round" of bureau reports. Once I look at them and look at his/her shoebox of saved documents, the Zen side takes over, and the disputes write themselves. You can use the templates, sure, but every person that reads them at the bureaus has read it all before. You need two things. 1) A defendable position...with a document. and 2) A new freaking story that they have never heard before. Now the next part of the creative process here is the "drinking game" part. And the client loves this. This is where we go back and forth, writing the most OBSURD dispute letter you could think of. Now we probably won't use what we come up with, but the exorcise is valid, and it puts the client at ease. However, you might end up using one! I had a client named...hmmmm....okay, I had this client that shared a name with lots of people...let's say "John Smith" even though it wasn't THAT pedestrian. Now, "John" needed to get rid of a BK. I did a search of his name on the internet, and printed off a copy of every person with his name that had a web page. A search at bigfoot.com revealed nearly 1000 email addresses for people that shared his name. I printed that as well. Then I "generated" a newspaper story about him and the fact that he "shared" a social security number with somebody else with the same name. You see in the "news article" um.. "John" got his soc first thanks to his fast acting parrents, but another boy born the same month in the same hospital with the SAME NAME was issued a "replacement card" when the clerk that got the request deduced the parrents had used the wrong form.... Now that is ABSURD! And I assure you that it worked ONLY because it provided a great laugh to everyone that looked at the dispute. Oh, the name was also used for the hero of a third rate sci-fi book series from the 50s. We included a copy of one of the books with the name highlighted in yellow, and the cover marked with the words, "Also not me" That is the exception, not the rule, but you can see how walking away from the templates and doing some role playing and story exercises, can broaden your efforts greatly. wesaidso Moderator 82 Posts Posted - 08/19/2002 : 1:19:04 PM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- OH I KNOW HIM MR. GREEN HORNET..........
Another thread on BK I was in: Omega_Prime Junior Member USA 104 Posts Posted - 08/17/2002 : 12:40:20 PM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Well let's look at the anatomy of the credit bureau's reporting of a BK, and break it down, first. 1. How did the big three even find out about your BK? Government rarely initiates the reporting of anything to the big three. Remember they are not themselves a government agency, even though they try to take on that air. The answer is that is probably one of three things: 1. Some data harvester somewhere pulled that info out, along with a truck load of other data, and sold it to to the "Big Three" bureaus. This practice is notoriously faulty, and highly suspect, as newspaper notices courthouse postings never inlude a social security number to make a "positive ID". I had a story of an entire state getting reported for a bad credit item, but I can't find the link, so I will not tell you an unverifiable story. Maybe somebody else has it. 2. Sometimes your lawyer is "helpful" and forwards your entire folder full of generated docs to the big three, with an instruction letter that all of the creditors that show up are to be reduced to ballance 0, and listed at >included in BK<. If this is done, your lawyer will now be the contact person FOR the big three every time you dispute. If they back off or don't reply, they still have a list of "included in BK" accounts to call and verify that the BK is real, thanks to your "helpful" lawyer. Let me re-state, this is ONLY helpful if you are going for a FHA mortgage two years out from ground zero, otherwise it hinders your efforts to remove the BK it's self. 3. Every party involved in the BK, including your creditors, will recieve notification. They will have paper showing them that you filed a BK, and they may be the ORIGINATOR of the bureau's info on the matter! However, after two years, many creditors have you only in electronic file, and any copy of a document has long since been trashed. Remember, the more time that passes the easier it is to get anything removed! Okay, so now we know how it got there, now what do we do? 1. Send a dispute letter. I never dispute more than three things at a time, so as not to get a client branded as somebody engaged in "credit repair". Any item, included in BK or not, if it can't be verified after a dispute, it will be removed from your report. There is NO item that has never been removed from a credit report. 2. Dispute a different three with each bureau. This gives you a quick feel for which items are "soft" and will come off easy, and which ones are hard, and will require more documentation for removal. How you "generate" those documents are up to you, and I will not coach you on that aspect. 3. Time is your friend, and patience is a virtue, especially in credit repair. Two years out the number of creditors that can verify ANYTHING in your file, starts to drop significantly. Dispute directly to the creditors if lots of time has passed. Ask to see a copy of your signature, or demand that THEY remove or at the very least "UNRATE" the item. Construct a dispute letter that skirts the issue of a law suit, but still uses phrases that gives that "idea". For example, "My lawyer said.." etc. Never threaten to sue, however, unless you really plan to do so. You can be snottier with these guys, as you are no longer their customer. Only get snotty with the bureaus as a last resort. Do not offer to pay off the account, as you will just reset the clock. If you give them so much as a dollar, the account comes back to life, and you may even have waived your BK protection. This is dangerous ground to tread if you are not sure of what you are doing. Now, once you have removed all the "included in BK" stuff on your file, (or waited 7 years for it to come off) you can get the BK it's self removed. I can't give you the phrases I use, because I don't want them to become widely used, and thus ineffective, but you need to deny in some way that you were ever under the protection of bankruptcy. More than likely they will not want to really send for your actual report from Chicago. It costs them $50. Once they see they have no free alternative, that is they don't have an "included in BK" account to call up and verify for free, they may drop it. They may send you a letter asking for a document that granted you relief from the BK. You can either take the stance in a follow up letter that since they have you mixed up with some other guy, there is no such doc.....or you can "generate" a document. Forgery is a felony, and I will not teach you how to do it. Omega_Prime Junior Member USA 104 Posts Posted - 08/17/2002 : 1:10:59 PM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Couple more pieces to the puzzle. (dirty tricks) 1) Try having a meeting with any creditor that really still has the original doc, or that can produce your signature. Make an appointment to view all the originals at a particular office, and suggest that you will, once satisfied, negotiate a "settlement" Give them a week then dispute their items again with the big three. The originals are not where they are supposed to be, and you may be able to take advantage of the confusion and get an item removed from all three bureaus. 2) Always send your "hard" items to the big three for dispute on the following dates. June 20th, November 1st, December 12th, and if any of your creditors are in a town that goes crazy for a month, dispute that item, in THAT month. Example, if your creditor were in Indianapolis, you would dispute the item in May. The Indy 500, you see. Why? Well, the generic dates put you in times of vacation for many Americans. You will not be dealing with the "first string" either at the bureaus, or at the creditor's office, hopefully both. Also, Christmas time, the last thing Radio Shack cares about is verifying your report! 3) You can make an appointment to view your own original BK paperwork in Chicago (if enough time has passed.) They hand you a dusty box, and you sit down and thumb through it. It cost $60 which included a certified copy. Do not attempt to take anything out of your file. It's all probably on microfilm anyway. It would also be a felony to slip a document in, that granted you relief from the BK. Especially if it was slipped in right before a dispute, or before you had a certified copy made. Unless the document were genuine, then it probably should be in there...for the sake of accuracy and all....hey, I am just saying.
And probably my most useful advise in a BK: Omega_Prime Junior Member USA 104 Posts Posted - 09/18/2002 : 2:30:27 PM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Heh heh...this is one of my favorites. Prepare for a full year of disputes on this one. First, make sure that all the "included in BK" accounts are gone. After 7 years they should be. Then you will spend the next year or so sending dispute letters every 60 SIXTY!!! days. (There are exceptions but this is a trickey procedure...the trickiest in credit repair, just after judgements. When in doubt, wait at least 60 days with BK disputes.) Once the first CRA falls, and it will most likely be Transunion, send a copy of that report to the other two as an argument. Once you have the second one drop it, then you have TWO reports disputing the BK on the last one. Send them BOTH clean reports, and that should be the last letter you have to send. Don't forget to get those pesky old addresses removed first as well though. Good luck!
You can look up Minnesota BK filings at: http://www.mnb.uscourts.gov/ You even read other people's BK papers here!
Oh dear, this thread crosses ALL my personal boundaries! And you charge people for this? humphhhhhhhhhhhh Sassy
I have to go with sassy on this one....if omega is doing this as a business then he certainly is engaging in out and out fraud...beware of anyone who suggests such out and out fraud. clc
Woah woah woah! The only course of action I suggest is from that last post. If you look at my fraud and forgery post, it CLEARLY says at the top, DON'T DO THIS. In context, that post was in reply to somebody who thought that there were no such schemes and that I was bragging about knowing about them and not posting them. Two people seemed to want to know all about the subject of removing a BK. I posted everything I know, along with warnings. I will restate what I said in that post, (and you can scroll up and read) it is presented for educational purposes only. These snips represent all of the things I have ever seen or heard of getting a BK off of a credit report. I assure you I do not engage in forgery for hire! I am not sure if that was an honest mistake, or if I have again wandered into a board full of industry shills. To recap my suggestions: 1) Get the connected addy removed, along with any other factors that link you to the BK. 2) Get rid of the "included in BK" items. 3) Dispute the BK with all three. 4) When the first one drops (probably TransUnion) use it against the others. 5) When the second one drops, use them both agains the third. Convincing a CRA to take an item off before they legally have to through letter writing, and disputes is in no way illegal. Anyone who suggests it is, is a shill for the industry.
I only charge for results. you know as well as I do, you can't charge for credit repair work before the fact. If I get a BK removed and you get a mortgage several points lower than with a BK, I have perhaps saved you $80,000 and probably more. How much is $80,000 worth? Certainly worth my paultry fee.
