"Can You Use Credit Counseling Without Bankruptcy?" 

As you probably know under the new 2005 bankruptcy laws credit counseling class is now mandatory with no exemption for anyone who files for bankruptcy. See more about these changes in our Chapter 7 Bankruptcy, Chapter 13 Bankruptcy and Bankruptcy Questions pages.

Credit counseling service is not only going to handle your credit card bills but also most private information. Because of this you should think twice who you are going to hire. Perform a thorough check of the service and make sure you hire both a competent and trustworthy service.

First thing to do is to check as many services or companies as you can find on the internet. You can also check your local Yellow Pages but that, in my opinion, is much slower and less efficient way to search. You’ll get far more info searching the web and in much less time then searching the Yellow Pages. 

By checking up on them online you can get costumer reviews, also ask around about costumer satisfaction on the internet groups and forums. You can also check for a BBB (Better Business Bureau) signs (these are not awarded easy) and other marks of the reliable service.

Credit counseling agencies offer myriad of services, some will offer you their service free of charge, while others will do that only if they believe you are consumer in need of their service. Naturally there are also services which you’ll have to pay for. Some are going to ask for up front payment, while others will charge you at the end of the process. 

Right from the start you need to find out exactly how much you’ll have to pay for their services, you don’t need any surprises here. When you decide if you are going to hire a certain agency, you can sign the contract and start with your credit restoration. Most of the work from now on will be handled by credit consolidation service.

Credit counselors will help you come up with a debt consolidation plan; they’ll outline what you need to do in order to clear your outstanding balances. The credit counseling service will take in calculation all of your income, as well as any possible unforeseen financial troubles that can come your way, for example unexpected medical bills.

All your debts are then merged in to one monthly based payment. Sometimes your credit counseling service may decide to buy your debt from the creditors. The agency can also mediate between you and your creditors and convince them to extend the loan grace period, accept a lump sum payoff or suspend the collection for some time.

Credit counseling service can help you to speed your way to credit fix and start fresh all over again, but not even they can fix 100% of the damage you have done to your credit score in the past.

Even if it can take you some time to clear negative items from your credit report, by working with a credit counseling agency you can significantly speed up your effort.

Hiring a credit counseling agency without bankruptcy filing will enable you to start making regular payments and that will have a positive effect on your credit report and it will also be extremely important for any of your future credit applications...

Credit Debt Relief Programs - How Legally Take on the Credit Card Company and Get Out of Debt I will start this write up with a small story. There was a friend of mine who was in a very familiar situation, which thousands of you might have already been in. He was in deep debt and was keen to start repaying a portion of his debts. He had heard...