How can I improve my credit rating?

[missis]

I have just discovered that my credit rating has been drastically reduced by two forgotten £12.00 payments to a store card last year. The debt was sold to a debt collecting agency who also appear on the credit report as a default payment.

I paid the bill as soon as I realised and the store card forwarded the money to the debt agency who ended up owing me money because I paid too much and was not informed as the store card had sold on my account. I have since received a cheque from the agency but it has adversely affected my credit rating in a big way.
I did dispute this with equifax but was unsuccessful

Can I pay to remove this record from my credit report?

you can pay for it to show as satisfied

to get your credit rate up you need to have good payment record , so put small ammount on credit card each month and pay it off in full every month and this will bring your score back up...

what was you credit score number?

No. I still have missed payments from 2004 showing on one of my credit reports. It'll drop off next year and all payments are up to date from then. I've been trying to improve mine too as it's suffered because we've moved house. So:

Make sure you're on the electotal roll
Makes sure the credit report shows you as registered at that address. If they don't, get a copy of your electoral roll entry from the electoral registration officer and send it to the agency

Make sure your address exists in the Post Office Address File (PAF) - this is used to check the address exists and ours WASN'T on there as it's a conversion of a stables. The fact that it wasn't has affected my credit rating. I have now corrected this by writing to the PO, getting the PAF changed and informing all the ratings agencies

Don't move jobs or banks for a while if you can help it.

It helps if you have a perm job and have been employed for a reasonable length of time

Make sure all other payments are up to date, set up direct debits to ensure they're paid in future

Anyone who says they can remove this is lying. It will take time and if it is the only dark spot in an otherwise ok record you may find it won't affect you after a while.

I couldn't even change mobile phone supplier recently because my sodding address didn't exist on their PAF. Luckily it did exist on Vodafone's so I went with them instead.

You can write to any of the agencies (callcredit, Experian and Equifax) and ask for copies of your credit report for £2.

The No was to your question Can I pay to remove this record from my credit report? BTW.

391 I do have credit cards and other than this have always had an excellent credit history.

please don't use any agency which claims they can remove parts of your credit report. they can't.

what i'd do is make them put a note on the file saying you dispute this. they HAVE to do this.

Many thanks, good advice.

391 was that your credit score? just for 2 missed payments.
TBH i am shocked i have 3 CCJ's and mine was higher so it doenst make sense....
I ahve recently been looking into this as previously i have been to scared to look but i wish to buy a house next year so need to do everything to help mine... once my ccj are paid i can pay the court to put them as satisfied on my credit report

martin lewis website has loads of helpful stuff on it