A bankruptcy can have a devastating effect on your credit score. A bankruptcy listing on your credit reports to many lenders is the only thing they need to see to determine you are completely unworthy of credit.

Many people will tell you that it is impossible to remove a bankruptcy from your credit reports. The truth is that you can dispute a bankruptcy the same as you can any other type of derogatory account on your credit report.

Note that whether the account is "really" yours or not has no bearing on the credit bureaus responsibility to verify it. If it cannot be verified, it must be deleted. Period. According to the Fair Credit Reporting Act, the burden of proof is on the credit bureau.

Please let it be clear that it's never ever wise to be dishonest when communicating with credit reporting agencies, plus it is totally unnecessary. There are many ways to dispute the bankruptcy without lying.

Did you know that the credit bureaus don’t even investigate public records? The courts will only verify such records in person. The credit bureaus will claim that they have a system to verify such records, but when it comes down to it, they don’t. They also know that if a consumer were to seek litigation and financial damages in a court of law, they would be in big trouble.

I had my bankruptcy removed from 2 out of 3 of my credit reports. The one that would not remove the bankruptcy claimed that they verified it electronically and that it’s public record. It is indeed public record; they were right about that part. But, I asked them who they verified it with and they said they verified with my local courthouse. That’s impossible since the local courthouse confirmed that they only verify public records in person – not electronically, not through the mail, and not over the phone.

This particular credit bureau is much harder to work with than the others. They are very adamant about keeping items on your credit report whether they are accurate or not. This credit bureau has also been sued the most. And as long as they refuse to properly investigate accounts according to federal law, they will continue to get sued the most.