The main free credit reports as you all know come from Equifax, TransUnion and Experian. You are entitled to one free credit report per year from each agency if you visit the government mandated site at AnnualCreditReport.com. However, if you want to monitor your credit more closely you may want to get monitoring service from one or more of the bureaus. Equifax is one of the big 3 credit bureaus that has authorized giving away annual free reports. In order to get your credit report, you have to request it either through mail, by phone or online through the AnnualCreditReport.com site which was mandated by the FTC.
I have been studying these services and learning about them for many years now. The one question I have is how can finding out you are a victim of identity theft or credit card fraud protect you? Once you know you are a victim it is already too late. When you begin to see signs of identity theft on your credit report the damage has already been done. Logically expecting Credit Monitoring to protect you from identity theft would be like studying for an exam after you fail. Identity theft is a process and the last result of it is seeing accounts on your credit report that do not belong to you. These accounts are usually in default with late payments or have gone to the point of collection or charge off.
Collections - are accounts that have not been paid at all and have been sent by the original creditor to a third party collection agency or the collection department of the creditor. Collection agencies may be lent the debt for a commission and if they are successful in collecting funds from the debtor they earn that commission. Other collection agencies buy the debt from the creditor for a reduced amount and they become full owner of whatever is collected. Once you understand this you can also see why they are so aggressive about getting consumers to make payments.
There are many packages available and most will offer a combined 3 bureau credit report. This can be a great convenience since the format of the reports from each agency is different. The combined 3 bureau report will be in the same format and will make it easier to spot the differences between each report. Once you have established great credit you will most likely want to do everything you can to keep it that way. For this reason, monitoring your scores is vital in maintaining that great credit you worked so hard for. All of the monitoring services that I have reviewed or personally used have email alerts that will let you know about major changes in your report or score.
The 3 major free credit report agencies play different kinds of roles besides giving out credit reports. Their entire roles are very important to your credit. Although not all services they have are free. You have to spend or subscribe in order for your credit to be fully protected.
When a monitoring service only alerts you that a change has occurred and does not tell you what the details of the change are we find consumers in a panic. They now know there is a change but don't have any idea what changed. You can be updated of an alert when a 3rd party pulls your credit profile if you are shopping for a car, home, or business loan. You may be updated with an alert when you open or close an account or have a new late payment. Alerts come when balances change as well. If you don't have details on what the alert is you will be in a continual state of panic. Credit is not stagnant and with so many changes happening daily these alerts could come all the time, daily, weekly, or monthly depending on how active your credit profile is. You can see there is much homework to do when deciding on a monitoring service. If you are highly educated about your credit and monitoring services it could be helpful for keeping you aware of the general picture of your credit portfolio. If you are uneducated or don't have the time to keep track of your current credit situation it could be a source of continual anxiety and frustration.
I have been studying these services and learning about them for many years now. The one question I have is how can finding out you are a victim of identity theft or credit card fraud protect you? Once you know you are a victim it is already too late. When you begin to see signs of identity theft on your credit report the damage has already been done. Logically expecting Credit Monitoring to protect you from identity theft would be like studying for an exam after you fail. Identity theft is a process and the last result of it is seeing accounts on your credit report that do not belong to you. These accounts are usually in default with late payments or have gone to the point of collection or charge off.
Collections - are accounts that have not been paid at all and have been sent by the original creditor to a third party collection agency or the collection department of the creditor. Collection agencies may be lent the debt for a commission and if they are successful in collecting funds from the debtor they earn that commission. Other collection agencies buy the debt from the creditor for a reduced amount and they become full owner of whatever is collected. Once you understand this you can also see why they are so aggressive about getting consumers to make payments.
There are many packages available and most will offer a combined 3 bureau credit report. This can be a great convenience since the format of the reports from each agency is different. The combined 3 bureau report will be in the same format and will make it easier to spot the differences between each report. Once you have established great credit you will most likely want to do everything you can to keep it that way. For this reason, monitoring your scores is vital in maintaining that great credit you worked so hard for. All of the monitoring services that I have reviewed or personally used have email alerts that will let you know about major changes in your report or score.
The 3 major free credit report agencies play different kinds of roles besides giving out credit reports. Their entire roles are very important to your credit. Although not all services they have are free. You have to spend or subscribe in order for your credit to be fully protected.
When a monitoring service only alerts you that a change has occurred and does not tell you what the details of the change are we find consumers in a panic. They now know there is a change but don't have any idea what changed. You can be updated of an alert when a 3rd party pulls your credit profile if you are shopping for a car, home, or business loan. You may be updated with an alert when you open or close an account or have a new late payment. Alerts come when balances change as well. If you don't have details on what the alert is you will be in a continual state of panic. Credit is not stagnant and with so many changes happening daily these alerts could come all the time, daily, weekly, or monthly depending on how active your credit profile is. You can see there is much homework to do when deciding on a monitoring service. If you are highly educated about your credit and monitoring services it could be helpful for keeping you aware of the general picture of your credit portfolio. If you are uneducated or don't have the time to keep track of your current credit situation it could be a source of continual anxiety and frustration.
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Frank Miller has a Debt Consolidation Blog & Finance, these are some of the articles: Non-public Agents In Property Investing You have full permission to reprint this article provided this box is kept unchanged.