Credit and charge card fraud costs cardholders and issuers hundreds of millions of dollars each year. While theft is the most obvious form of fraud, it can occur in other ways. For example, someone may use your card number without your knowledge. It’s not always possible to prevent credit or charge card fraud from happening. But there are a few steps you can take to make it more difficult for a crook to capture your card or card numbers and minimize the possibility...

The National Consumer Law Center has created guides addressing your credit card and debit card protections and legal rights. For more information, please view the attached factsheets.

You see the advertisements in newspapers, on TV, and on the Internet. You hear them on the radio. You get fliers in the mail, and maybe even calls offering credit repair services. They all make the same claims but how can you repair your credit without hiring an agency?

The Federal Trade Commission created a webpage addressing various ways you can improve your credit yourself, please click the link below.

English: Repairing Your Credit Yourself - English.

Spanish/Espanol: Repairing Your Credit Yourself - Spanish

Five Different Sample Letters to Send Debt Collectors

Wondering how to respond to a debt collector?

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau created the following sample letters to help if you:

• Need more information 
• Do not owe the debt 
• Want the debt collector to stop contacting you while you dispute the debt 
• Want the debt collector to only contact you through a lawyer 
• Want to specify how the debt collector can contact you .

For more information, please visit The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's website here: https://www.consumerfinance.gov/consumer-tools/debt-collection/.

Ageing Safely has developed the following three forms to help with consumer law issues or issues dealing with money and debt: 

• Letter to a creditor to request debt forgiveness when a bill is owed
• Letter to a creditor to dispute a charge from a bank or company
• Letter to a credit bureau to dispute an item on a credit report

Please visit Ageing Safely's website for links to these interactive forms: https://agingsafely.us/free-forms/.

Utah State University has devleoped a PowerPay Tool: Helping Debtors Become Savers which guides people through the process of paying off and eliminating debt and saving.

PowerPay helps you develop a personalized, self-directed debt elimination plan. Discover how quickly you can become debt free and how much you can save in interest costs by following your debt reduction plan. Utah State University Extension is pleased to provide this debt management tool without any cost to consumers worldwide.

To use the PowerPay Tool, please visit Utah State University's website here: https://extension.usu.edu/powerpay/.

If you’ve maxed out your credit cards and you’re getting deeper and deeper in debt, chances are you’re feeling overwhelmed. How are you ever going to pay it down? Now imagine hearing about a company that promises to erase your debt for pennies on the dollar. Sounds like the answer to your problems, right?

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC), the nation’s consumer protection agency, says slow down, and consider all the steps that can get you out of the red without spending a whole lot of green.

See the guides below in English and Spanish for more information. 
 

For more information regarding the truth about credit reports and credit repair agencies in English, please see our guide in English below.

Para informacion en Espanol, ha clic "La Verdad Sobre el Informe de Crédito Y Las CompañÍas de Reparación de Crédito."