American consumers are now entitled to receive one free copy of their credit report per year from each of the three major credit reporting agencies. Equifax, Experian, and Trans Union are now all required by law to furnish to you a copy of your credit report. This is good news for consumers; please read on for additional helpful information.

As of September 1, 2005, the federal Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) requires that the three national credit reporting agencies provide one free copy of your credit report to you annually. You do not need to contact the three reporting agencies separately to obtain your reports, instead you can order them online at www.annualcreditreport.com; or by calling 877-322-8228; or by completing the Annual Credit Report Request Form and mailing it in.

The mailing address is:

Annual Credit Report Request Service

P.O. Box 105281

Atlanta, GA 30348-5281

The online form is available here: www.ftc.gov/credit.

If you need copies more often, you can contact the three reporting agencies and request copies directly from them. You will be charged for any reports over and beyond your one free annual report.

To purchase a copy of your report, contact:

Equifax

800-685-1111

www.equifax.com

Experian

888-EXPERIAN (888-397-3742)

www.experian.com

Trans Union

800-916-8800

www.transunion.com

What is the best way for you to benefit from the new law? That’s easy: order copies of your reports from the companies on a four month rotating basis. Most consumers will find this method to be adequate as it will allow for you to compare reports from each agency. Naturally, if you already suspect fraud you will want to order all three reports at once and notify each agency to place a “fraud alert” in your credit file.

There are also several private companies who will get a hold of all three copies of your credit report for you as well. There are fees involved, but you may find their services to be less of a hassle than contacting the three companies separately.

In summation, the new law is a bonus for consumers. Published reports indicate that many credit reports contain errors in them; this law gives you the opportunity to correct “their” mistakes by setting the record straight and at no cost to you.

Copyright 2005 — Matthew Keegan is The Article Writer who writes on a variety of topics including: advocacy, automobiles, aviation, business, Christian themes, family, news, product reviews, travel, writing, and more. Samples from his portfolio are available right online.

Navigating a credit report can be a bit confusing but it is important to understand how all of those numbers affect you whether or not you are considered credit worthy. A credit report is broke into four basic sections and each one is important to your credit score.

The first section contains your identifying information

This is just the basic information that identifies who you are. It can include a list of addresses where you have lived, your name and any other names you have gone by, your social security and driver’s license numbers, spouse’s name, date of birth and telephone numbers that have been linked to your name.

The second section contains your credit history

This section will list all of the credit accounts that you have. It will tell how long you have had the account, what kind of account it is, if it is a joint account, amount that the loan was for or the credit limit you have, total amount that you owe, amount of monthly payments, Status of the account, and if you have been making your payments on time. This section might also include notes that tell if you typically pay late or have a debt that was never able to be collected.

The third section contains your public records

This section includes any bankruptcies, tax liens, or judgments against you. If it is in the public records, it will show up in this section of your credit report.

The fourth section contains inquiries

Anytime someone requests your credit report, that information goes into this section. That means that every time you fill out an application for credit, that credit request will be noted on your credit report. Not all inquiries on your credit report were initiated by you. Soft inquiries are those requested from companies looking to contact you unsolicited and offer you a pre-approved loan or credit card.

View our recommended sources for a personal credit report.
Also, check out our recommended online companies to help you eliminate credit card debt, or view our recommended lenders for home refinancing for people with problem credit.

Keep Your Credit History Clean - Remove A Negative Credit Record From Your Credit Report.

It can make a difference of up to 18% in loan repayment costs.

For example, on a 30-year, $150,000 fixed rate mortgage, a borrower with the best credit score, 760-850, will pay 5.59%, or $860 per month, while someone in the worst score range will pay 7.18%, or $1,016 per month.

This can make a big difference to the household budget, so it’s to your advantage to keep your credit score as low as possible.
The 3 major credit bureaus, Experian, Equifax and Trans Union are similar and feature a “Credit Score”, which is derived from credit report information submitted to them about you.

Uner the Equal Credit Opportunity Act, a credit scoring system may not use characteristics such as race, sex, marital status, national origin or religion as factors, though they are allowed to use age.

Credit scores are determined by your bill-paying history, the number and type type of accounts you have, late payments, collection actions, and outstanding debt. The total number of points reflects how likely you are, statistically-speaking, to pay back a loan.

If you are denied credit, the Equal Credit Opportunity Act forces the creditor to tell you the specific reasons your loan application was denied if you ask within 60 days. Acceptable reasons include high balances on charge cards, or bad employment history. Unacceptable reasons include vague excuses such as “You didn’t meet our minimum standards”.

Sometimes you can be denied credit because of information on a credit report. The Fair Credit Reporting Act requires the creditor to give you the contact information of the credit report agency supplying the information.

The credit reporting agency can give you the information on your report, but only the lender can tell you why this led to your application being refused.

However your credit report may include inaccurate or incomplete information (credit records). Identity theft is a growing problem, and can take up to a year to resolve.

Nearly 10 million people fall victim to identity theft each year, costing consumers $5 billion and businesses $48 billion, according to the Federal Trade Commission.

In this situation you have to send letters to every one of the credit bureaus. Also learn your credit rights by familiarizing yourself with the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FRCA).

The FCRA gives you the right to dispute inaccuracies and omissions, and it requires credit bureaus to investigate your complaint (generally in thirty days), send you a prompt response and correct any errors.

The law as well requires the source of inaccurate information (such as a bank) to correct the record at the credit bureaus to which it initially provided the erroneous information.

Consumers working on their credit reports say many times their letters are ignored by credit bureaus. Consumers say even with proof a credit record isn’t theirs, its removal from their credit report can take 3 or even 4 challenge letters, because the credit bureaus will have only corrected the facts in their own files and not updated the credit report.

Send your dispute letter by REGISTED MAIL. Credit companies will respond faster if they know you can prove you filed a complaint on a certain date. Keep a record of when you sent the dispute letters and what date you should expect a response.

If you have received no defense to your claim after thirty to thirty seven days, send another registered letter requesting an updated credit report and demanding the disputed credit record be deleted.

If the bureaus don’t reply in the thirty days, it must be that the information they had on file was either inaccurate or unverifiable. In either case, based on data from the Fair Credit Reporting Act, the credit record must be immediately deleted from your credit report.

A few consumers have eliminated negative marks on credit reports just by going through this process of disputing credit records many times. Since some creditors will not take the time to respond, you can sometimes win by default.

Usually a bit of progress will be made with each challenge.Remember, the credit bureau would like you to quit bothering them because if you are not disputing the credit report, they can legally carry on selling it as profitable information.

About your Credit History by Frank Hague