I have recently really wanted to get my act together and work on my credit. I have a very low credit score and I'm trying to take care of that. 517, 544 and 557 are my credit scores. I have some bills I neglected for a couple years, a department store credit card, outstanding power bill, health insurance bill, other small stuff. Since these have been on my report for about 2 years, would it raise my credit score by trying to settle with them? These are all in collections I think. Besides taking care of these, what can I do to raise my credit?

Well, I closed my bank account and let Check n Go Bounce. so, it went to the "first" collections. they just want to collect my delinquent payment of $680.00. The balance of the loan still sits there. AAGH! They said I can't do anything until the loan is delinquent (30 days) and in the meantime they want me to pay this $680 past due payment in 4 payments, which I really can't do tight now. Can anyone help me with this? I am not getting anywhere with the collections department. All they have is this past due payment there, not my loan balance and they won't work with me beyond that.

My husband and I are leasing a home with the option to buy it in the next 3 years. We are hustling to get our credit in order and consulted a mortgage broker who looked over our credit and gave us some advice, but some of it conflicts with what I've been told before, what I've read, or what I've seen posted here.

I wasn't sure to post this here or on the Payday Loan forums, but I thought that since it deals mainly with cleaning up our credit report, I should post it here. I have three entries on my credit report from Allied (collection agency) collecting for what appears to be the same PDL (all have exact same date, account number, and amount) from BMG Internet Payday Loan. Now, I did have an internet payday loan a few years ago, which I paid the principal (and then some)towards but then could not keep up with the payments so I had that bank account closed and haven't looked back.

I received a letter from the IRS saying they intend to terminate my installment agreement. The Form is called a CP523. It said I had missed a payment(s). It says I have 30 days to respond, either send the past due amount or we will terminate your agreement. However, it also says to call them and they will see if they can reinstate it. So, have they terminated it or not? I called them this week and the IRS rep said I was fine and I just needed to send my most current payment. He put me on hold several times checking on it so I am kind of worried.