Free Credit Bureau Report With No Strings Attached
by Brandon Cornett
Yesterday, I received the following question from a confused consumer through my Credit Q&A blog:
"I see a lot of offers for free credit bureau report online, and even on TV commercials. But whenever I visit the actual website and read the information there, it seems like I have to sign up for something and pay a fee. Is there any way to get my free reports with no strings attached? Where do I go?"
If you share this reader's confusion, let me start by saying you are not alone. This is one of the most common questions I receive from consumers, and it's easy to understand why. I see those "free credit report" commercials on TV all the time. I also encounter a ton of banner ads for companies who offer the same thing.
But therein lies the confusion. Some of them charge a fee, while others do not. Some offer credit scores and other items in addition to the reports. It's completely confusing, so I am happy to set the record straight.
Here's what you need to know:
By law, you are entitled to one free credit bureau report per year, from all three of the companies who maintain them (TransUnion, Equifax and Experian). These companies have a joint website through which you can request all three of your reports at once. The website is AnnualCreditReport.com. In terms of getting your credit bureau reports for free, this is the only website that the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) endorses and recommends.
Many companies will actually package all of this information together and then add on some kind of credit monitoring / identify theft prevention service. So they use the "free" credit reports and scores as an enticement, but then you find out that you have to sign up for the monitoring service in order to get the freebies.
That's why I used the phrase "no strings attached" in the title of this article. To the best of my knowledge, the only place where you can get a totally free credit bureau report with no strings is through the jointly owned website mentioned above -- the one recommended by the FTC. Hopefully this will alleviate your confusion once and for all.
Yesterday, I received the following question from a confused consumer through my Credit Q&A blog:
"I see a lot of offers for free credit bureau report online, and even on TV commercials. But whenever I visit the actual website and read the information there, it seems like I have to sign up for something and pay a fee. Is there any way to get my free reports with no strings attached? Where do I go?"
If you share this reader's confusion, let me start by saying you are not alone. This is one of the most common questions I receive from consumers, and it's easy to understand why. I see those "free credit report" commercials on TV all the time. I also encounter a ton of banner ads for companies who offer the same thing.
But therein lies the confusion. Some of them charge a fee, while others do not. Some offer credit scores and other items in addition to the reports. It's completely confusing, so I am happy to set the record straight.
Here's what you need to know:
Free Reports from All Three Credit Bureaus
By law, you are entitled to one free credit bureau report per year, from all three of the companies who maintain them (TransUnion, Equifax and Experian). These companies have a joint website through which you can request all three of your reports at once. The website is AnnualCreditReport.com. In terms of getting your credit bureau reports for free, this is the only website that the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) endorses and recommends.
Many companies will actually package all of this information together and then add on some kind of credit monitoring / identify theft prevention service. So they use the "free" credit reports and scores as an enticement, but then you find out that you have to sign up for the monitoring service in order to get the freebies.
That's why I used the phrase "no strings attached" in the title of this article. To the best of my knowledge, the only place where you can get a totally free credit bureau report with no strings is through the jointly owned website mentioned above -- the one recommended by the FTC. Hopefully this will alleviate your confusion once and for all.
Labels: Credit scores
posted by Brandon at
8:24 AM
