subject: Life's Best Free Things Include Your Credit Report [print this page] Since nothing is free in this world anymore, everything else that you cannot pay falls under credit. However, in order to get a new loan, credit card or good insurance you must have a good credit report. Do they charge you for that, too? Not necessarily. You can get a free credit report as mandated by the federal law once every 12 months. You will only pay if you need another report within the year after having previously claimed that free report.
Your credit report is commercially available from Consumer Reporting Agencies, the most common of which is the credit bureau. They prepare your credit report and sell them to whoever wants a copy of the report such as your employer, creditor, insurer or other businesses that wants to find out how financially capable and credible you are. Your free annual credit report is for your own convenience. Once your credit report is sold, it will now be known as consumer report.
So, how do your employer, creditors, insurers and other interested party read your credit report? These people will be concerned with only one thing and that is your credit scores. These scores are the summary of all the information contained in your credit report and they are used to predict your creditworthiness. This means, your financial capability and how responsible you are when it comes to paying your debts are shown through your credit scores. Your credit score is computed using a method developed by Fair Isaac and Company known as FICO.
These days you can claim your free credit report through the internet. There are three major credit bureaus that may be in possession of your credit report and these companies are Equifax, Experian and TransUnion. These major companies have websites of their own. There are, however, conditions that you have to meet before you can get your free report and these are: (1) you are unemployed but have plans to find a job within 60 days, (2) you are on welfare, and (3) you have an inaccurate report due to fraud. All these should be certified in writing.
If you fail to meet the requirements mentioned above you cannot avail of the free annual credit report even if you have not requested for a report at any given time within the year. Some credit bureaus charge up to $9 a copy for credit reports so be sure that you are qualified for the free copy. It is important that you know your credit report as much as your creditor or insurer. In fact, it is wise to get a copy of your credit report to assess your chances of being granted a loan even before you apply for one.
