Understanding Your Credit Report
Understanding your credit report is essential to ensure your credit score is as high as it can possibly be. In the long term this will ensure that you have access to finance at the lowest possible rates so spend a few minutes to discover what you need to know by reading this article.
The first thing you should do is get hold of a copy of your credit report so that you can make sure that everything included in it is correct. It’s very easy when companies are entering information on to computers for them to make mistakes by transposing figures and letters. When you get hold of your report don’t skim read it but go through it line by line. Get all your financial agreements out and cross check between them and the report.
You will find that included in the report are details such as your full name together with your addresses for the past few years. It’s important that you make sure that all the spellings are correct as are the dates for your residency. The report will also include your date of birth, social security number and details of both your past and present employment.
The inquiries section will list everyone who has requested your file in the past two years for whatever reason including employers and potential employers. It’s important that any and all of these employment-related inquiries are ones that you agreed to in writing.
The next section will cover all your financial agreements one by one. These will include information which covers the date you took out the loan or credit card, the amount it’s for, or in the case of a credit card it’s credit limit, the current balance and the monthly repayment. For each account there will also be a record of your payment pattern showing whether you pay on time or whether you are a habitually late payer.
If you find anything that is incorrect you should contest it by opening a dispute with the credit bureau immediately. Companies such as Experian allow you to do this online but you can contact all the agencies in writing and ask them to check into the disputed item. Under the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) they are legally obliged to follow up on all such disputes and if you are not satisfied with the outcome they are compelled to let you add a statement of dispute explanation to your file.
If you have a spouse you will find their details maybe on the report you get. These details are not included in any reports requested by lenders or potential employers who wish to run a check on you.
It’s quite a common misperception that included on your credit report are details about your race, religion, political views and criminal record amongst other things. None of these things are allowed to be recorded on your file as under the Equal Credit Opportunity Act (ECOA) a company cannot discriminate against you on the basis of any of them.
Understanding your credit report is essential to ensure your credit score is as high as it can possibly be. In the long term this will ensure that you have access to finance at the lowest possible rates so spend a few minutes to discover what you need to know by reading this article.
The first thing you should do is get hold of a copy of your credit report so that you can make sure that everything included in it is correct. It’s very easy when companies are entering information on to computers for them to make mistakes by transposing figures and letters. When you get hold of your report don’t skim read it but go through it line by line. Get all your financial agreements out and cross check between them and the report.
You will find that included in the report are details such as your full name together with your addresses for the past few years. It’s important that you make sure that all the spellings are correct as are the dates for your residency. The report will also include your date of birth, social security number and details of both your past and present employment.
The inquiries section will list everyone who has requested your file in the past two years for whatever reason including employers and potential employers. It’s important that any and all of these employment-related inquiries are ones that you agreed to in writing.
The next section will cover all your financial agreements one by one. These will include information which covers the date you took out the loan or credit card, the amount it’s for, or in the case of a credit card it’s credit limit, the current balance and the monthly repayment. For each account there will also be a record of your payment pattern showing whether you pay on time or whether you are a habitually late payer.
If you find anything that is incorrect you should contest it by opening a dispute with the credit bureau immediately. Companies such as Experian allow you to do this online but you can contact all the agencies in writing and ask them to check into the disputed item. Under the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) they are legally obliged to follow up on all such disputes and if you are not satisfied with the outcome they are compelled to let you add a statement of dispute explanation to your file.
If you have a spouse you will find their details maybe on the report you get. These details are not included in any reports requested by lenders or potential employers who wish to run a check on you.
It’s quite a common misperception that included on your credit report are details about your race, religion, political views and criminal record amongst other things. None of these things are allowed to be recorded on your file as under the Equal Credit Opportunity Act (ECOA) a company cannot discriminate against you on the basis of any of them.
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