I had never really been fully aware of the importance of maintaining good credit. You're never taught at school about how it might affect your life going forward and when I finally realised the impact it could have on me it was a big surprise.

I finally began to look into ways of improving my credit, to be debt free, buy a house and support my daughter - she'll soon be going to college. You know, The American dream!

The companies you're fighting with have all the resources and it seems like an uphill battle.

All of the credit repair companies I looked into were very expensive. I paid more money than I could afford at the time and was lucky if I got any resolutions within the first 3 months of signing up. Eventually I couldn't spare the expense and just put if off to the side.

Suddenly the economy took a turn for the worse and I was laid off from my job. Then last year Hurricane Harvey hit and I lost my car in the flooding. When I went to get it refinanced, the APR was far greater than I had initially paid. It seemed as if it was just one thing after another.

I joined a group on facebok that helps people improve their credit and one of the first recommendations I got was to join Collection Shield 360. Once I enrolled, I noticed that collection accounts were being deleted straight away,and even better they weren't reappearing on my credit report. I thought it was too good to be true!

Even when the disputes were unsuccessful, I was provided a letter template to send to the Credit bureau which I recently sent, and to my surprise - it worked!

I tell people at work they need to sign up, and all my family and friends are on it. Knowing you are backed by a team who will go to bat for consumers is a great feeling - you can't beat that!