2. Disputing vs Challenging

Welcome. This is Kenney Cowell and in this module, we are going to be covering disputing versus challenging. So this is module 2 of week 3, and I am really, really excited because I’m going to break down some stuff that 99% of people who are in the credit industry don’t even understand or even know. And this is the reason why you’re going to have success when following this format. So let me go ahead and hop in. So here is what we are going to cover. So the very first thing I’m going to hop into and talk about is what is the credit dispute method and how it works and this is what the majority of people do, but I’m gonna break it down and make it clear in terms of what that means. Then we’re going to get into the credit challenging method, which is at the end of this particular module, you’ll understand, you’ll have a really, really good understanding and be able to move forward with confidence.

Then what we’re going to get into is a credit report and settlement agreement and right below this video, I’m going to include the link directly to this. It’s something that you wouldn’t have even known happened. I’m going to get into why we challenge because this is very, very, very powerful. Once you understand this, and then lastly, I’m going to really break down and make clear the difference between disputes and challenges. So let’s go ahead and hop in. So what is a dispute? Well, that’s a great question and dispute, as it stands, especially with what the law states is an argument of the fact of truth, the fact of correctness, or the fact of its completeness. Now, when you dispute, what you’re doing is a dispute assumes an item on your credit report is inaccurate, is incomplete, untrue, untimely, not yours or not your responsibility or not compliant.

Now here is a huge, huge issue with this. Now, 9 times out of 10, if we’re being honest, if there is something that’s negative on your credit report and unless you were a victim of identity theft, then that item actually is yours. So there’s, there is some sensitivity to say that, Hey look, because it is your right as a consumer, so I’m not by any means trying to take any rights from yourself or myself. It is your right to dispute any erroneous item on your credit report. However, when you are disputing by law, what you’re saying is this item is inaccurate, incomplete, untrue, and timely, not yours or not my responsibility or not compliant. When in fact you more than likely know if that collection, that charge off that whatever happened to you financially and I’m not judging, okay? So I don’t want you to, I don’t want that to come off as, the thing I’m giving you the facts is not yours.

When in fact, you know, it is. So generally speaking, if you have negative item, or if you have negative items on your credit report, then typically they were caused by you. You have some sort of responsibility. So this approach is somewhat unethical because you’re claiming items on your report aren’t yours. When in fact they actually are. So this is a lot of issues here. And like I talked about in week one, the quick credit fixes, when we do the dispute method, this is what we’re doing. And you’re literally, this what the fact is saying. So again, this is a dispute. Now in the previous module, I really broke down Metro 2 Compliance, E-Oscar, all that information. And I’m going to go into more detail, but this really goes into why and how this system is set up for you. Now, the credit challenge method based off what you already know now about E-Oscar, the Metro 2 system, all that good stuff is when we challenge, we’re asking for certification of truth.

So I’m not saying it’s not mine. I’m just asking you to certify based off what the law says, the correctness and completeness of such item. I just want you to certify what you’re saying, that you’re reporting about me. So when you challenge, you’re not claiming that a negative item is inaccurate. That’s not what you’re doing. You’re not claiming it’s incomplete, untrue, untimely, not yours, not your responsibility or that it’s not compliant. When we challenge, what we’re doing is we’re asking the fact that the bureaus have certified, they have certified based off what the Metro 2 definition says and what the E-Oscar says. You’re saying, and they’re saying, Hey, I’m asking you to certify that this is Metro 2 compliant with the E-Oscar system, right? That’s what the challenge does. And that’s why it’s so effective because essentially you’re circumventing something that you believe, you’re led to believe may or may not be compliant with the Metro 2 system.

Now here’s where all this goes and here’s what this comes to. And let me break this down. So that way you understand this. Now, even myself, I used to break down and talk about the Section 609 templates and that dispute method, however, this happened. So the CRSA Settlement agreement happened back in 2015 and essentially what happened was the New York state attorney general and the majority of states in America came together in 2015, and they went against the bureaus i.e TransUnion, Experian, Equifax, and Innovis regarding their desire to transfer information electronically, regarding the need for a wet signature contract. So, again, remember, I was breaking this down about how did the E-Oscar and all this stuff. The New York state attorney came to them and said, Hey, look, you know, this isn’t what the law says, but the credit reporting agencies gave them some pushback and said, Hey, look, man, the Fair Credit Reporting Act is a little bit outdated.

You know, especially Section 609 and any other section that the fair credit reporting act is saying that, Hey, look, we require these wet signatures and all this stuff. I mean, we’re in 2015 at this point, we need to be able to transition to the new century. At this point, we need to be able to leverage the technology and all these things available to us instead of doing this outdated method and not to mention when people send disputes specifically for Section 609 or Section 611, or whatever the dispute is when they’re sending that dispute, but let’s just use Section 609, they’re not even referencing the deeper specifics of Section 609. They’re just sending a dispute and it’s costing us time and money and energy to try to verify what contract signature, when a lot of banks and financial institutions have really transitioned to doing a lot of stuff online.

So what happened was, the judges, the courts, the state reached and created an agreement that allow electronic verification and transfer of consumer data, so hence the reason for the Metro 2 compliant method. So E-Oscar was already around. E-Oscar was already doing this, but this is why the state attorney came to them and said, Hey, look, man, you guys are verifying information electronically. You’re not even notifying consumers of this. You’re not even doing the reasonable investigation. Like what’s the deal with this? And the bureaus was like, well, the deal is that the consumers are sending stuff about the signature contracts and they’re not even in place. So they had to come to this agreement. So let’s break down what this means. So before this act, E-Oscar was defined as an accurate and compliant system for verifying information.

Like I broke down. However, the system wasn’t informing people of the Metro 2 compliance that was enacted. And it wasn’t informing people that this is what was actually happening. So as of March 2015, after the settlement agreement, the CRSA Settlement Act was approved in the CDIA (Consumer Data Industry Association) and let me break this down the Consumer Data Industry Association, and you can look this up and I’m going to provide the links to both below this video, below this module, but let me break down the Consumer Data Industry Association. So when you break down what this industry association is, it is you guessed it, the reporting agencies themselves, it is the TransUnion, it’s Equifax, and Innovis, it’s Expeiran and then any other reporting agency associated with them, they are part of this organization. Now, this organization, although they’re a part of it, it’s still unpartial, non-biased organization, and this organization guides what’s going on and, ensures that the act itself, the act of 2015 is making sure that the reporting agencies comply with this requirements, because they’re saying, Hey, look, we’re going to come to a middle ground here, but we’re going to make sure we step in to ensure that this actually happens and the credit reporting agencies now inform people of this verification.

And now that this is taking place electronically with the verification of the documents because again, it was just being sent to E-Oscar. People didn’t know. That was the biggest, that was the biggest issue. So they came to this particular agreement and that is what happened. Now let’s continue. Now, here’s the biggest thing that happened after the settlement agreement. So this act changed the definition of E-Oscar. So again, the E-Oscar system was there, but the definition was basically saying that, I’ll have it on this slide. It’s an accurate and compliant system for verifying information, but this accurate and compliance system doesn’t necessarily include the Metro 2 compliant definition that I defined before. So because of that, you’re essentially not giving the Metro 2 a notification of reporting, which is a notification, letting the consumer know that you’re not complying with the electronic verification of that information.

Ah, you see that? So now equipped this knowledge, any judge or court can now hold them accountable. And along with the laws that are in favor for us to this new definition of Metro 2 Compliance and how this is going to work. Now, we as consumers, nor the courts, ask them at this point to verify and add that definition to it. We just say, look, we need you to, we need you to tell people. So now, because they put that definition along with the E-Oscar system, they volunteered this information and the pursuit of, you guessed it, the electronic verification of disputes and information. So that’s why that happened. So why am I bringing all of this up and why is this even relevant? Well, I think you’re kind of tracking with me about how these laws are working and how this information happens.

But after this settlement, really what this means is if the bureaus are not Metro 2 compliant, then they have to remove the information according to how the settlement agreement is written. And that is the power of this. That is the power of making sure you challenge because you can now circumvent the information that is on the report based off not necessarily saying it’s accurate, not necessarily doing anything unethical, but based off what this law, in this settlement, and what Metro 2 Compliance actually means from a reportability perspective. So again, we’re not, we’re not saying anything about the account. At this point, really what we’re doing is we’re, we’re really asking questions about the reportability of set accounts based off compliance, laws, and stuff that are in our favor. So this is powerful, powerful stuff, right? So that being said, this is why we challenge. The main reason why we challenge reporting agencies are most often compliant.

Right? So you’ve got to understand that typically they are compliant, right? Typically they’re following the rules and the laws. However, it still takes time, effort, logistics, and manpower to certify the completeness of the item that they’re reporting. Right? So this is, it’s still saying that, Hey, look, you got to stick at it. They’ve got to spend their resources to continue to do this. And additionally, they must be, this must be presented to us as a consumer in a format that we can understand. So when we send in the challenge and the bureaus have to respond, they not only have to respond. They have to respond in a way that is going to essentially make us understand what it is that’s compliant and all this stuff. Now they’re not going to get into the weeds of Metro 2

and all of this. They’re just going to present it to you in a compliant way. Now, why is this so important? Well, this now becomes very costly and burdensome to the bureaus and the reporting agencies to complete this process each time you send your request for compliance or challenging for them to certify the reporting of whatever item you’re challenging in question. So if you continue, cause again they have to now go a step further to certify whatever it is that they’re complying and then they’re going to send that information to you in a format and get that letter out to you. All of this is costing money. It’s costing manpower and it’s costing resources. So this leads us to, the credit reporting agency being just like any business, a for-profit industry. So because it’s a for-profit industry, I don’t see this industry saying, Hey, look, you know, we’re going to transition to being a nonprofit organization

or nonprofit industry. No, this is credit. This is money. So like any business, their goal is to make money and maintain a profit and a process. So if that’s their goal like any other business and you as a consumer, have a consumer compliant request or a request for them to verify the certification of said item in question starts to cost them more money, time, resources, whatever the case is to certify that particular item, then their profitability to keep reporting the account then becomes as simple business decision. Like man, this dag on account is costing us more to continue to certify its compliance. Then it is just to keep reporting it. So you know what? This is no longer a good business decision for us. So heck we’re just gonna just, you know, it’s no longer profitable, we’ll just remove it. Because again, they no longer have an incentive to continue to report that information rather than why don’t we keep reporting?

Why don’t we keep certifying? It’s like, eventually this is costing us money. So we’ll just go ahead and remove it, right? So if they can’t, it won’t be removed from compliance, which typically is the first thing, then eventually it becomes no longer a good business decision for them, right? And this is very powerful to understand as we get into the weeks and this process. You have to understand this. So that being said, why disputes come back? Now, it’s not because it was removed for the wrong reason. So I’ve already broke down in the beginning of this particular module why disputing is kind of like a thing that is questionable. So even if you’re able to get that item removed, anytime the information is removed from your credit report using a dispute method, it can be put back as long as it’s compliant.

Right? So, so it can be put back as long as it’s verified as compliant. And then it goes back to the same exact thing where it’s not common, you know, it is a common misconception that just because you have an item removed with that dispute that said item won’t come back on their reports. But again, they based off timing or based off, however, they were doing that dispute because sometimes you can dispute something and the bureaus don’t follow the timing and then if it’s not following the timing, they’ll get it removed, but then they can just put it right back. So anytime information is disputed and removed and it’s worthwhile to come back i.e profitable for to come back, then it’ll come back. Right? But the difference here, the huge difference. The difference is that when and deletion happens because of it,

so basically the dispute usually gets a deletion because it’s a violation of any type of infraction of the law or because of bureaus and answering time, whatever the case is. However, once that information is verified as compliant, which is why we’re focused on compliance, right? Once that information is verified and compliant, it will be re-reported versus when you challenge. And this is really what I want to leave you with based off everything that I’ve already covered is if the item is not removed due to compliance issue, which typically it is because they’re not going to be able to verify that certification of truth based off how the system is even verifying information because of what we know about the electronics, E-Oscar and all that stuff. Typically, it’s going to be not profitable for them to continue to report that information because of the continuous challenge of you sending in this information.

Because again, if you dispute, you can dispute that can come back, verified. And it still, if it’s still be, Hey, look, we verified this and we’re not and they reached a limit of dispute and it’s- hey look, we’ve looked and that’s why you have seen if you’ve been fixing your credit before you have seen that the bureau, Experian specifically will say, Hey, look, we have looked at this information. We will not pursue an investigation again with this dispute, right? That’s why they do that with the disputes. That’s why you get to a place where, Hey, look, we’re not going to re-investigate this. We’re done re-investigating this because we already know the way you’re trying to dispute is not accurate and we’re not going to do it. Versus what the challenge, when you continue to challenge, they have to go through that compliance process because you’re asking for the certification of truth.

So eventually when you continue to do this process, and now it becomes a business decision. It’s like, Hey, look, man, let’s just go and remove this because we’re going to have to continue to certify this. And this is taking the time. This is taking resources. This is taking money, and this is no longer a good business decision for us, especially if this is a closed account, let’s just go ahead and remove it. And that is why the challenge process works. And once you get it removed, and let’s just say, you get removed now today. And let’s just say, and I’m not saying it won’t come back, but just think about it. If you get it removed now because it was removed for compliance or it’s no longer profitable, six months from now if it wasn’t profitable now, what’s going to make this profitable later on in the future, right?

It’s not going to get more profitable all of a sudden, because they’ve already reached the threshold of making that decision, but no longer being profitable. And that significantly increases the chances, even when you challenge that item that had been coming back on your credit report because of the fact that it’s no longer a good business decision. So, that is another powerful reason why the dispute, I mean, the challenging process works because they have to continue to respond to your challenge versus a dispute. They can reach a threshold and say, we’re not going to do it. So with that being said, you guys now understand the power of challenging and why you are going to challenge, and how you’re going to leverage this process in the rest of this particular program. So with that being said, I will see you in the next module.