The Truth Behind Free Credit Reports
Gerald Shaw asked:
Credit monitoring is a good way to keep track of changes in your credit scores or credit accounts. It can be a 24 hour service, in which any changes that have been made in your credit whether or authorized or unauthorized by you, is updated immediately. As such this allows you to see whether somebody has hacked into your account or tampered with your credit scores.
In addition, it allows the consumers to keep track of errors that might have incurred in reporting purchases. This eliminates the hassle of rectifying such mistakes, which often takes days or weeks to iron out. Credit monitoring also provides regular reports from all the big three credit agencies Experian, Equifax and Transunion. It removes the need to send hard copy reports on your credit scores. Scouring through a mountain pile of reports and meticulously checking them can sometimes be a pain.
Now, the Congress has mandated an act which requires all three credit agencies to send free reports about consumers’ credit scores, at least once very 12 months. Consumers, can go to the website www.annualcreditreport.com, and check and monitor their credit information from Experian, Equifax and Transunion – all for free. This is the only website online that is authorized by the federal government to give gree credit reports. The problem, however, is that credit bureaus have still not stopped nor has it prevented them to pitch sales or market their services to consumers.
This issue becomes thornier when some credit agencies have posted hyperlinks on www.annualcreditreport.com, which leads consumers to their own websites, and traps them by letting consumers pay for their service for a fee. Some of these hyperlinks can cause confusion among consumers. For example, one client complained that while she was applying for a credit report for free, the link sent her to Experian’s website, and required her to gain access to unlimited reports about credit and credit scores, in exchange for a membership fee.
As such, it is recommended that the Federal Trade Commission must prohibit such forms of manipulation and malpractice of credit bureaus which are selling and marketing their services. It is the right of consumers to checking credit reports for free, and this must be true at all times. Because a credit monitoring company has the obligation to protect consumers’ rights, most especially their credit monitoring information, credit agencies must be transparent about the services they are offering to its consumers, whether they are free or not.
Joan
Credit monitoring is a good way to keep track of changes in your credit scores or credit accounts. It can be a 24 hour service, in which any changes that have been made in your credit whether or authorized or unauthorized by you, is updated immediately. As such this allows you to see whether somebody has hacked into your account or tampered with your credit scores.
In addition, it allows the consumers to keep track of errors that might have incurred in reporting purchases. This eliminates the hassle of rectifying such mistakes, which often takes days or weeks to iron out. Credit monitoring also provides regular reports from all the big three credit agencies Experian, Equifax and Transunion. It removes the need to send hard copy reports on your credit scores. Scouring through a mountain pile of reports and meticulously checking them can sometimes be a pain.
Now, the Congress has mandated an act which requires all three credit agencies to send free reports about consumers’ credit scores, at least once very 12 months. Consumers, can go to the website www.annualcreditreport.com, and check and monitor their credit information from Experian, Equifax and Transunion – all for free. This is the only website online that is authorized by the federal government to give gree credit reports. The problem, however, is that credit bureaus have still not stopped nor has it prevented them to pitch sales or market their services to consumers.
This issue becomes thornier when some credit agencies have posted hyperlinks on www.annualcreditreport.com, which leads consumers to their own websites, and traps them by letting consumers pay for their service for a fee. Some of these hyperlinks can cause confusion among consumers. For example, one client complained that while she was applying for a credit report for free, the link sent her to Experian’s website, and required her to gain access to unlimited reports about credit and credit scores, in exchange for a membership fee.
As such, it is recommended that the Federal Trade Commission must prohibit such forms of manipulation and malpractice of credit bureaus which are selling and marketing their services. It is the right of consumers to checking credit reports for free, and this must be true at all times. Because a credit monitoring company has the obligation to protect consumers’ rights, most especially their credit monitoring information, credit agencies must be transparent about the services they are offering to its consumers, whether they are free or not.
Joan
