Pro Money Investor: April 2010

Credit score report is maintained by authorized agencies for each citizen basing on the information they get from lenders,credit card companies and other businesses.They are voluntary organizations funded by lenders and they give back this information to the authorized business people.This information enables them to take right financial decisions.

Each credit report in the broader scene consists of four parts like

1.Your identity information
2.Your Credit history
3.Inquires that are happening about you
4.Public records.

Let us have a look at each individual part in detail.The identity part is the infomration that you provide to the creditors and it will be reflected as it is.It consists of information like

Name
current address and previous two addresses
phone number
social security number
driving license number
birth date
spouse name
house that you own and their information
your present income
current employer and
your previous employers.

Credit History Part of credit report

It consists of accounts information that you have with different lenders,retail stores,credit card companies.It also includes the accounts where you are authorized like your wife accounts.Consists of each account number and some further details like

1.Date of opening of the account
2.What kind of account it is3. Is it alone account or joint account
4.The amount of loan you have to pay or highest balance on credit card
5.Monthly amount that you have to pay on each account
6.Outstanding balance and
7.Any missed or late payments.
8.Past due details that are sent to the agency.It is a bigger negative remark than a late payment if it exists in the credit report.
9.The details of in active accounts for a long years depending on the balances that you had on that accounts.
Inquiries

Credit bureaus keep the information who is asking about your credit report information in the report.This list includes lenders,land lards,credit card companies,service providers and insurance companies.It will be there in the record for a minimum of two years.

Any credit application inquiry is a hard inquiry and your own request or employer request is treated as soft inquiry.

Information about the People with good credit report will be sold by the agencies to different people and they send you back some offers like pre approved loans.This kind of inquires are not going to effect your report and treated as soft.Some times this may reflect badly on your report and loans that you want to get.If you want to avoid this kind of situation you can ask them not to sell your information to business and for that you have to call call 888-5-OPTOUT (1.888.567.8688) to remove your name for two years from mailing and telemarketing lists that
come from the big three bureaus.

Public Records The natural information that exits in public records includes

bankruptcies;
tax liens;
foreclosures;
court judgments; and
overdue child support.

This information will be there in your report for a time of seven years.

As a citizen you have a right to get Free Credit Bureau Report from the authorized agencies and it consists of important data regarding your money payment habits with the respect to the commitments that you have taken.It effects the way that you are going to get the loan and credit offers from big companies and for not very rich people it is going to be very important.In US the credit score varies from 450 to 850 points and it will decided basing on your repayment methods.If you are at a number around 450 it is even very difficult to get a credit card and on the other side if you are around 800 credit companies will be running for you with great offers.

This credit score helps the lenders to learn about the risks in terms of money repayments and whom they can trust.In United States of America there are three major credit bureaus—Equifax, Experian and TransUnion.They collect information from banks,lenders and various sources about each individual and compile them in the form of a credit report.Basing on this report a particular three digit score is allotted to each citizen.

If some one has rejected a job or a loan basing on your report you have a right to know what went wrong and the agencies are having the obligation to give it free to you with in the sixty days of the problem .Besides this you have a right to get a free copy of credit report once in a year from every one of the three agencies mentioned above. Depending on your requirement either you can get all the three reports once or at regular time intervals.

Access to your report is limited to only authorized people like lenders and banks,insurers etc.Modern credit reporting agencies are funded by lenders to felicitate and make a choice of customers for them.Any way they can not act one sided and there is a rule called The Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) which will protect the interests of the consumers also.

Being a consumer you have some rights according FCRA like

1.Get a free report once in a year.

2.Right to know who received your report from the last one year and from last two years if it is for employment purpose.

3.Right to know who the lender who contacted the agency and rejected you the favor of granting the loan.

4.Right to demand a correction if there are errors in the report.

5.Right to have an investigation with in the thirty days of your report about inaccuracy.

6.Right to add summery explanation if you are not happy about the details of the report.

7.Right to limit the access of report to some one who has bad intentions and want to make harm for you.

8. Right to remove your name in the lists which CRA to sell some one for marketing purpose.

9.Right to sue for damages if some one accessed your report with out legal authority.

Pro Money Investor

Credit Score Reports What do they Contain

Free Credit Bureau Report FCRA and Your Rights