(KCEN) -- This time of year many Americans are feeling stressed about paying holiday bills.
But watch out, you may now start seeing ads that claim they can turn around your credit score in no time.
While it's important to improve your financial health, you want to be careful about believing some of those credit repair promises.
Credit repairs take time and the best place to start is checking your own credit report and make sure it's accurate.
That's something you can do for free from the website, annualcreditreport.com.
Credit Counselor Manuel Navarro said, "Because anything on your credit report that can be fixed, corrected, you can do yourself without having to pay for it."
Experts say not to respond to an ad from an email or someone you've never heard from online.
Asking your bank or credit union for recommendations is a good place to start.
There are also legitimate non-profit credit counseling services that can help you clean up your report where there are mistakes.
