FAQ

Madgett Law’s consultation fee is currently $249.

You are paying for a consultation appointment that determines if you have any issues on your credit report. If you become a client of the law firm, all of your fees that are required to be paid are paid by the credit bureau that has inaccurately reported your information. The fee exists simply to pay for the expertise of our intake specialists to identify issues on your reports, and drafting and mailing your Fair Credit Reporting Act compliant dispute letters. This fee is the only fee that the credit bureaus are not required by law to pay.

We help with everything, but we specialize in:

Violations

• Identity Theft (our true specialty)
• Mixed Credit Files
• Client Statements
• Intra-Bureau Disputes
• Inter-Bureaus Disputes

Errors

• Incorrect/Wrong Names
• Incorrect/Wrong Addresses
• Incorrect/Wrong Phone Numbers

That depends on how quickly we can work with you, but typically within 60 days from your intake appointment. Once we have your dispute letters drafted and mailed, per the Fair Credit Reporting Act, the credit bureaus have 30 calendar days to conduct an investigation. Once the investigation is concluded, your file spends approximately 5 to 10 business days with our processing team to ensure you have the best representation possible.

Not very good from our experience. More often than not, the credit bureaus state that nothing was found to be inaccurate in their investigation. The credit bureaus are required to send you a response letter stating what they have found and what they will, or won’t, do to remedy the issue. But even then, often the credit bureaus won’t reply.

Our time of completion from the day of your intake appointment to reaching a conclusion is about six to nine months. However, we have experienced a time to completion about no more than two months when certain factors arise. It just depends on the factor of your specific case.

The credit bureaus typically remove the incorrect information within 30 calendar days. But if they have not, contact the attorney that was assigned to you and inform them that nothing has changed.

You can always call our front desk at 612-470-6529, or your attorney (if you have one assigned).

In only TWO circumstances would Madgett Law ever charge you anything more than your consultation fee: Ghosting and personally retaining an outside attorney.

Ghosting: If we cannot get in contact with you for six months and any progress has been made on your file, you will be held financially liable for that time.

Retaining Another Attorney: If you allow our attorneys to complete any progress on your case and you seek another attorney to represent you in the same matter you will be held financially liable for that time.

Both of these circumstances ONLY arise if you have signed an agreement to become a client of the law firm. You have become a client of the law firm, if you have signed our contingency agreement, you will be charged at the rate the attorney bills (~$600.00 per hour) for the time they have worked on your case.

A contingency agreement is an agreement you make with a law firm in which you are ONLY required to pay for your attorney’s fee if you win and are awarded damages. In cases like credit repair, the Credit Bureau is responsible for paying ALL of your attorney’s fees, so you end up paying us exclusively for the intake appointment.

A fee is a thing that an attorney charges you. So, whether your attorney works for you on an hourly basis or contingency, the money you pay your attorney is a fee.

A cost is something that is assigned to you by a court. So, court fees associated with your case are assigned to by a court, not Madgett Law.

It is important to understand that there is a difference. Madgett Law works diligently to remove as many costs from your path to credit correction, but sometimes special circumstances arise where the court requires you, the client, to pay for the associated cost. Fees, however, are something that Madgett Law has limited to only your initial consultation fee.

The Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) is a federal law that regulates how consumer credit reporting agencies collect, store and share your information. It protects the consumer when it comes to credit reports and credit scores. It requires that credit reporting agencies provide accurate information about your credit history. It also provides you with certain rights when it comes to dealing with your own personal information.

The FCRA helps you by providing protection against inaccurate or unverifiable information on your credit report, giving you the right to dispute any errors on your report, and providing you with a means of obtaining a copy of your own personal report. The law applies to all three of the major credit bureaus, Equifax, Experian and TransUnion along with dozens of similar companies registered in the United States that collect and sell your personal data. Moreover, the FCRA allows consumers to have their attorney’s fees paid for by the credit bureaus.

According to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), four in five credit reports contain some sort of error. Some issues are obvious and easy to spot, however most errors and violations are found in the small print. Identifying errors requires looking at ALL of the data contained in a credit report and analyzing it down to the smallest detail. Errors and violations in your credit reports can lower your credit score, which could hurt your ability to get new lines of credit or make the terms of credit more expensive. It is important to monitor your credit reports regularly so that you can take corrective action right away when errors occur.

Absolutely not. You can certainly attempt the dispute process on your own. It is strongly recommended that you work with a consumer protection attorney. This is because, per the Federal Trade Commission and Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, you have a 2% chance of successfully removing errors and a .2% chance of successfully removing violations. 

We, at Madgett Law, are not tax professionals and cannot give tax advice. All we can recommend is that you talk to you tax profession about how deal with the amount on the 1099. The bureaus and furnishers are likely going to give you a 1099 for the amount of money that was forgiven. This is a pretty standard procedure that we recommend speaking to your tax professional about.