Not All Credit Scores Are Created Equal
Only a few short years ago, before the Fair Credit Act changed it all in 2003, you were not allowed to know what your credit score was. Now it seems that there are thousands of companies on the Internet who would love to provide it for you if you cannot figure out how to get it yourself.
However as you have so far read in this guide not all credit scores are created equal. For instance the credit bureaus sometimes market scores to consumers like you that aren’t based on the Fico formula. This is a mock credit report that conceals a lot of what you need to know from you. The score that you want to see from any credit bureau is the FICO score as this is also the “secret” score examined by lenders.
Seeing what the lenders see is the entire point of pulling your credit score so don’t settle for a credit report which is more like a polite summary that can sold to you by one of three main credit bureaus (or by any credit outfit for that matter!)
If you are writing to a credit card bureau and are demanding to see your score make sure you ask for a FICO score. By law they have to show it to you. Request the same if you are using an intermediary company to obtain it for you or you may be shown numbers that are not calculated using the FICO system.
However it may not be enough to simply ask for your FICO score. This is because to make things even more complicated, each of the three main credit bureaus calls its FICO scores buy a different name.
• Equifax and Equifax Canada call their FICO scores by the name “Beacon”
• Experian calls their FICO calls their FICO scores “Experian” or the “Fair Isaac Risk Model”
• TransUnion and Transunion Canada calls their FICO scores “Emperica”
To make sure you are accessing the right scores make sure you are able to impress upon the credit bureaus that you are serious by using the company’s own lingo for their FICO Scores. Otherwise you might be sent some other kind of score.
Although the Fair Credit Reporting Act required the credit bureaus to reveal credit scores to the general public, the law did not specify which ones. This is why it is always in your best interests to ask for the FICO scores.
You should also be careful not to be fooled by companies that offer free access to your credit score along with a credit card offer or credit reporting services. The hitch with these offers is that they often require you to sign up for ongoing financially related or credit-related services that are not free.
Another scam that is very common are operations that procure your private financial information or your social security number in exchange for providing you with your free credit report. Remember that you never have to go through a third party in order to procure your credit report. By law you are entitled to procure it on your own and the credit bureau must comply with your request to see it.
You should also beware of companies that try to charge you for procuring your credit report. Congress gave U.S. residents the right to procure their credit report for free in 2003. However the hitch is that you can only do this once a year from each of the three main credit card reporting companies. If you need to make an inquiry into your report more than once a year than the credit card companies are entitled to charge for them. As this is the case then you might be stuck paying to see a report if you want to look at them twice a year to see how your credit is actually doing.
In section “ How to Improve your credit score” of this guide we will talk more about how to procure your credit report and then how to analyze and understand it so you can improve your credit.
However pulling your credit report can take time. That is why in the next Part we are going to give you immediate solutions to credit problems so that you can start improving your credit before you are done reading this guide!