Have you, like millions of South Africans; have been denied a loan, clothing accounts, mortgages or even a job? Are you feeling that your life is standing still due to your bad credit rating? In this article will I explain, in depth, on how to remove the bad elements from your credit report, so that you can carry on with your normal life.

Part 1: Removing Judgement Listings

It is of utmost importance that you do not take any judgements on your credit report lightly. The law states that a judgement on the report should stay there for five years and while that judgement is on your report can you forget about getting any further credit from financial credit institutions. Do not stress, there is some light at the end of the tunnel. South African consumers who have judgements on their credit report should know that there are ways of removing those judgements before the five year time period.

1. The first step, which you should take is to obtain a copy of your credit report from MyCreditStatus.co.za.

2. Then you will have to contact the attorneys, which listed the judgements against you. You will find the names of them on your credit report. Request the outstanding balance from them.

3. Now that you know how much you still owe – this is the time to negotiate for a settlement amount and payment arrangements. They will then give you what is called a “Consent for Rescission of Judgement”.

4. When you have settled the outstanding amount then you should ask for Paid up Confirmation and Consent of Rescission of the judgement.

5. You should know that the magistrate should have the Consent of Rescission before you can go to the court.

6. Now that you have the consent letter, can you contact the involved court to schedule a hearing. You have to go to the court where the judgement was obtained.

7. When you go to the court, you should give the clerk the consent of rescission, you will then only be issued with a Rescission court order.

8. You will then have to submit the court order to the involved credit bureau.

9. An agent at the credit bureau will verify the rescission court order with the clerk and the judgements will be deleted accordingly.

Part 2: Removing Administration From Your Credit report.

At this point you might feel that your life has become completely to a stand still. You should know that being under administration will be seen as voluntarily, and that most of the South African consumers who are under administration have only recently founded out the true consequences which are involved by being under administration. One of the biggest consequences is that you were probably never told that you are not allowed to apply for any form of credit in the next ten years. Another consequence is that the creditors will only receive small payments every three months over the ten year time frame. In the next part will I explain how to get away from being under the administration process.

1. You can cancel the administration with the cooperation from the administrator and a 74Q document. Submit the document to the involved credit bureau and they should remove the notice.

2. If you and the administrator don’t get along that well, then you should take the matter in your own hands in order to cancel the administration process from your records.

3. You will need to write a letter to the administrator that will convince him that you are financially able to repay the creditors in order to remove the administration notice from your credit report.

4. The most popular and successful reason is to tell and convince the administrator that you are financially better of than the time when you applied for administration. Another thing that you can tell them is that the administration process is not making life easier for you, and you will be able to settle the debts better without administration.

5. I would suggest that you make use of a professional writer to help you with the writing of the letter. It should be done very professionally and should be very convincing.

6. The next step for you will be to give copies to the clerk of the court, all the credit bureaus involved and of course the administrator.

7. The clerk of the involved court will be able to help you set a date for a court hearing.

8. You will then have to go to the scheduled court meeting and state your case. Usually there will never be a credit bureau that apposes to your case, but if there are, then you should battle it out with the court magistrate. But as said, this usually never happens.

9. If everything goes according to plan and your letter is convincing then the magistrate will issue you with a rescission order.

10. You will then have to submit the court order to the involved credit bureaus and they will make sure that the notice of administration is removed from your credit report within twenty days.

Part 3: Removing Default Listings From Your Credit Report.

You should know that the consumer rights of South African consumers have only been recognised for about five years now. This is thanks to the implementation of the National Credit Act 34 of 2005. It will take a very long time for South Africans to be aware of their rights and how to exercise them. The National Credit Regulator of South Africa has ensured all South Africans that all credit providing companies should adhere to the rights of the consumers. Unfortunately we are still seeing a lot of companies who are taking advantage of the lack of information of the consumers. You should know that 99.9% of all the credit providers have at least once broken a section of the National Credit Act when placing a default listing on a credit report.

A lot of us have seen a default listing on our credit reports. Then the obvious thing to do would be to settle the outstanding amount. You will then expect the default listing to be removed from your report, but it isn’t. If you have settled the total outstanding amount of the creditor then you will see “Full paid consequent to listing”.

It is of importance that you know that a default listing – whether paid in full or not – will stay on your report for two years. There is only ONE way to get rid of these listings, and that is to answer the following two questions:

1. Have you ever received a notification IN WRITING from the involved creditor that they will put a default listing on your credit report?

2. Have you ever received a notification IN WRITING which states that you will get a listing at the credit bureaus in 20 days?

If one of the answers are no, then you should know that they have broken the law by violating your rights as a South African consumer. You then have the right to challenge the involved creditor. You will then have to follow the required steps to dispute the claim. The National Credit Act will then take the case up with the involved credit providers. The NCR will then give the credit bureaus 20 days to come to a conclusion. After the bureaus have come up with a resolution then the default listing will be removed from your credit report.

The above mentioned steps are practical steps and every South African consumer can take these steps. You should know that the system is still operated by humans, and humans do make mistakes. The procedures can take a long time and you can expect delays. Patience is very important and you should not get frustrated. You will have to make sure that your documentation is 100% correct, especially when it comes to court related issues. If you find the above mentioned steps a bit overwhelming then I would advise you to seek professional help.