Paid Credit Reports
December 21, 2009 Filed Under: Personal Finance
If you are a parent preparing to send your teen off to school, there is one talk you need to take a seat and have before helping them move into their dorm room. Thousands of youths fall prey to the cold hearted practices of credit card companies during their first years away from home, and finish up with massive credit card liabilities that takes years to pay down. to shield your teenager from this, it’s important to talk with them about Visa card debt, ID theft, and the advantages of having access to a paid credit report year round.
Now you may be asking yourself “Why should I pay for a credit report? I can all three of my credit reports for free every year. Isn’t that enough?” It’s true that annually, you can get free copies of your credit reports from all three credit reporting agencies. The major problem with relying on the free copies , however , is that your credit reports might be clean in September, but what occurs if someone takes your identity in October? You won’t know about it till the next Sep, when you again qualify for your free credit reports. With a paid credit report, not only do you have year round access, but they also show you your credit history, something the free credit reports do not do.
Of course, you shouldn’t just run out and start giving money to the 1st credit reporting company you find. The point of a paid credit report is to not only see your credit history and score, but to be ready to have access to your report, and to have someone monitoring your report year round. When you’re looking for a company, there are certain things you’ll be wanting to look for. First, look for companies that offer 3 credit bureau reporting ; what this means is that all 3 of your credit office reports are being monitored for key changes. There isn’t a need to pay for all three individually, so avoid corporations that only offer one credit office reporting.
As well as these things, look for agencies that offer your FICO score, and a good rationalization of what that score means. An extra bonus is live support, either thru online chats on their website, or by telephone. In fact , your resolution is to improve your finance situation, something that’s hard to do when you do not understand the FICO scoring system. It’s also a great idea to go looking for services to compliment your paid credit report,eg identity theft insurance and help with creating debt repayment agreements.
After you have found some agencies that offer all of these things, look for ones that offer extra services too. While at this time you will only want instantaneous access to your paid credit report, you will want additional services in the future. These would include debt repayment support, identity theft insurance, and help to correct errors on your reports. Three of the best credit monitoring agencies are the bureaus that basically create credit reports ; by choosing one of these agencies, you know you are getting a paid credit report that’s accurate, as they’re the ones who make your reports. Of course, there are other credit monitoring agencies out there, so don’t hesitate to get out and look for the one that matches not only your needs , but your budget too.











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