What’s a Goodwill Letter and How Can it Help You?

“To err is human; to forgive, divine.” – Alexander Pope

We all make mistakes and sometimes they are financial mistakes. Late payments, forgetting you owe a company money, or going through periods of unemployment can all lead to marks on your credit report.

If the tide has changed or you’ve learned the error of your ways you might realize that getting those bad marks on your credit report removed isn’t so easy. Usually it takes seven years for these marks to drop off your credit report, but you can speed up the process with a goodwill letter.

As explained by myFICO, a goodwill letter is one that is sent to a collection agency or original creditor requesting they remove specific remarks on your credit report or even the entire line of credit reported.

Your account should be in good standing meaning you’re not writing in to remove a debt you still owe. Your goodwill letter to creditors should note what caused the issue, how you corrected it, and what you’re doing and plan to continue doing to ensure it never happens again.

Although a positive aspect of a goodwill letter is that it can help improve your credit report and score, it could also lead to a dispute comment on your credit report or cross-reporting of the remark if it was not noted by other reporting agencies. If you are successful though the remark will likely be removed from your credit report without you receiving any additional correspondence from the collection agency or original creditor. If you plan on using goodwill letters consider finding a good credit monitoring service so that you can more easily see if any changes have been made.

To see examples of goodwill letters to creditors and even read some success stories, visit myFICO.