You actually get three free credit reports a year thanks to annualcreditreport.com — one from each of the reporting agencies. It makes sense to schedule them throughout the year (once every four months) to make the most of a free service.

If you are at all concerned about identity theft, I would second Flexo’s advise and get each of your three free credit reports, once every four months. I have set up email reminders to do this: January for TransUnion, May for Experian, and September for Equifax.

And if you are married, be sure to pull them for yourself and your spouse (with their permission, of course!)

Ive heard that when an inquiry is made into your credit report it will detract from the score if it is done too often. Will using annualcreditreport.com show up as an inquiry and detract from your score if you have applied to credit card companies recently?

True! Freecreditreport.com is misleading potential customers (my opinion) for financial gain. Thanks for the URL to the real free credit report site.

Also, having been originally duped by the freecreditreport.com ads into thinking it was the federal program when they first came out i cannot remember it stating anywhere that they are not the actual federal program, and im the kind of person that actually clicks and reads the legal crap in the privacy policy and terms of use on websites.

Dug up an old archive, notice the tricky langauge in this one, read it carefully for that 6 word sentence in the middle that is easy to gloss over. Notice they rename the free credit report as a central source, then state they are not the central source, this is chaining it to make it more steps neccessary to figure it out. Sure its simple once you sit and actually read it, but how many of us actually do that on regular content we read? Put it together with the misleading TV ads and you come to the website with the preset notion they are the goverment funded free credit report with no real reason to read the fine print. Its blatantly obvious someone actually sat down and mapped out the way to decieve while staying within the letter of the law.
http://web.archive.org/web/20050307015617/http://freecreditreport.com/

The problem with getting credit reports from any of the credit reporting companies is that you won’t be getting the same scores that they use to evaluate your credit. Instead you’ll get some consumer-number friendly that can deviate significantly from the FICO score that they’ll use to make credit decisions.

ConsumerReports.org also recommends calling 877-322-8228 because annualcreditreport.com can be tricky to navigate and easy to be sidetracked.

The phone method is pretty trivial. I’ve used it.

Thought it was funny that when I came to the site today there was a Google Video Ad for FreeCreditReport.com. ;)

I certainly agree that freecreditreport.com has a very deceptive ad. However, let me clarify a few items:

1. The free credit report you get annually does NOT include a credit score. It is only useful to determine if there are any inaccuracies. And you can get one from each of the bureaus each year. (It’s not a bad idea to space it out every 4 months so that you get a constant monitoring for free).

2. You can get your credit score for free from freecreditreport.com, but it’s a bit of a pain. You would need to sign up for their service and cancel after pulling your credit. They only let you do this once, and it requires you to fill in some forms and make an extra call to cancel, but it does end up being completely free.

3. Neither of these would be considered an “inquiry” on your credit or impact your credit score in any way. It WOULD impact your credit if any potential creditor runs your credit (with your permission, of course).

Just thought that might be helpful…

So why is it that it’s not possible to get your actual credit score (FICO)?

It is very possible to get your FICO score.

You just have to pay for it.

Great article. Credit monitoring is a service that almost no one willingly signs up for. Experian and other companies rely on these kind of tactics to gain new “customers.”

Experian (the parent of FreeCreditReport.com) has been fined neary a million dollars by the FTC for this kind of behavior. Barely a year after settling, the Florida Attorney General has opened an investigation into FreeCreditReport and affiliated sites.

I agree that you should monitor your own credit once every four months through annualcreditreport.com. In addition, PayPal is offering a free, though very barebones, credit monitoring service. It doesn’t hurt to sign up for that either.

Jeff

Blue text on a blue background that directs you to Annual Credit Report, and they still claim to be the leading provider of credit reports.

Absolutely classic.

To the person who asked above, no, checking your own credit report has no effect on your score, regardless of the number of times you check it.

FreeCreditReport.com is a joke! Through my credit card company they let me try it “for free”… what they didn’t tell me is that after a month, without ANY warning I would be charged 12 dollars. I’ve never even been to there site - my credit card’s website simply showed my score, so I figured they were providing it! Its been over a year now and I just noticed today they have charged me for a year of service. They are sneaky and a rip-off.

This is all too true.. as we speak.. I am trying to take care of the 12.95 that they charged me twice and also the 31.00 that they caused me for the overdraft. DO NOT use FREECREDITREPORT.COM it is a ripoff big time. Another thing to look out for is US Cellular. I was charged on my bank statement 75.56 for their services. Only thing is that I have NO cell phone from any company. I called them and they show no records of taking money from my account or recieving any money from me. Some one took it..

i would appreciate it very much if i can get the info.that i need to see what my credit looks like

What a scam. Like a moron, I went through the process, and realized all too late that the service was the wrong one. It took some time to cancel too. I first dialed, 1-877-481-6826, and then had to deal with the computer. It took four attempts before a human operator would answer the phone to cancel the account. To make matters worse there IS NO WEB BASED cancellation option. Nope, you must call that number and give them your social and other info OVER THE PHONE. Not safe at all. Even when you get to a person, the hound you with 20 questions about why are you canceling? etc. Bad all around.

I got burned by them too. Caught it after a month or so. I also got an email several months later about a class action suit against them. Gee…I can’t imagine why.lol

Does anyone know not to give a credit card # on anything that says its free? class action lawsuit? for what, agreeing to something you never even read? i guess there are millions of people out there that anyone can scam because no one seems to read and are capable of giving you their credit card #. If you can’t read and love to give out your credit card number, i recommend going to all sites and tv commercials to get your FREE products and gripe later.

need info. to try and cancel. was scamed also. have tried calling 2 different #’s. automated-
reached no one. calling Better Business dept.

thanks for the warning. I always look a request for my info over before i respond. Yes the TV ads for freecreditreport look very convinceing and also they have been advertised on KGO the consumer advocate show with Mikel Finney. So you really have to wonder who is paying attention. You have to rely on your own diligence in these matters.

any where you go you are asked fill this out Free credit information then enter your credit card number what the hell for? if I had a credit card probably wouldn’t need to find out my score!!! why advertise free to ask for payment? no where is it actually free!!! is just another way for rich folks to get richer!!

I just wanted to tell you that I am slowly but surely going through your entire blog and you are quite simply the best financial blogger on the net. I have written down so many tips from you in my finances notebook and just yesterday got my other two credit reports for free (really free) because of this particular post. You are amazing and have a reader for life. Col

Just to let you know. i just tried to go on the free credit report site and it is not working. Thank god for that and led me to this page with all this helpfull hints.

Thanks a lot for the info.

I think I am the only one who likes freecreditreport.com. The only reason is because it keeps up with my credit scrore for experian month to month. I like it because I have had a few instances of idenity theft and this helps me keep track if someone opens an account in my name or something like that. I don’t mind the $12.95/month because I always have the peace of mind of being able to see what my score is doing. Its all a matter of opinion really. I do agree with you about the better annual credit report website but this one happens to work better for me for the time being. Until I can get my booty back on solid ground after ruining my credit, I need to be able to check the score very often. I hope NONE of you ever have to deal with the financial issues I’ve had. You all sound like nice, smart, well informed people.

I understand that you can get some sort of freeze put on your account with the credit bureaus such that it tells any agency checking your credit report to NOT OPEN CREDIT. There is some process you would go through to unfreeze it whenever you needed credit for yourself. This is more for people who are seriously concerned about identity theft, and especially for someone who has had their identity stolen and is trying to prevent the dirty bas**** from opening any more accounts. I am not aware of any fees for doing this. This would be cheaper than the monthly fee for credit monitoring, as long as you had the time to go through the unfreezing process as needed.

Listen, i understand that some of you have been burned by freecreditreport.com, but here’s the thing, you do get a free credit report along with a thirty day free trial, before you even sign up it states important information, underneath it tells you that you are signing up for a 30-day free trial, it also states this in the terms and conditions, as well as above the space for the credit card number. Also, no matter what website, even if it says free, if it asks for your credit card then you shouldn’t enter it in.

I tried signing up for freecreditreport once, but it didn’t work right. I was very annoyed that I had to call them and such because I couldn’t get the account cancelled online and wasn’t even sure if I’d registered. Thanks for mentioning annualcreditreport. I’ll give them a look-over soon.

Michelle, you said:
“but here’s the thing, you do get a free credit report along with a thirty day free trial”
…
My “free” report cost me hours (I would estimate 6+) on the phone, trying to navigate their system to cancel my membership. And even after I cancelled it, they continued to charge me every month for the next FOUR months and only stopped when I threatened to sue. Every month I’d see the charge and have to call them, sit on the phone for ages, and then they would say it was cancelled. And come the next month, there would be yet another charge from them.

It was ridiculous. An absolute rip off, in my opinion. In my defense, all that happened before annualcreditreport.com came about. :P

I went through the federal site, it took me to the Experian site. At some point during the process I got kicked out (bad connection I suspect), and when I went back to Experian I wound up being sent through freecreditreport.com . I didn’t notice their “notice” and continued with what I thought was the standard process (not having done this online before). I got my report and score, and a month later I got a $12.95 charge on my card. I called the cancellation number, was hung up on a couple of times when I got to the human part of the process. When I finally got to the human, he gave me about an 8 minute hard-sell despite my repeated demands to be cancelled immediately. It wasn’t until he’d gone through this complete speech that he canceled me, and he made several ugly comments about my not having caught their “notice”. These people are definitely a ripoff and people need to be aware of that.
Who can I report them to?

Well, on the contrary to negative comments in regards to FreeCreditReport.com: How are you supposed to keep up with your credit history and make sure that everything is accurate if you only get to actually see it for FREE ONCE A YEAR. When you go to FreeCreditReport.com YOU DO get your free experian report and credit score; if you are only there for that and do not want to continue with what Triple Advantage has to offer, you cancel the account within thirty days when you began the trial. We as consumers have the responsibility to read what we purchase and buy. Plus, Triple Advantage is not that bad of a membership for 12.95 a month. After the trial period you are allowed to pull a new report and score everyday (without hurting your score since it is through the bureau) it monitors your three credit files for potential changes as inquiries, new accounts, past dues accounts, change of address, and public records, also it protects you against I.D. Theft with $50,000 of insurance. And if you have innacuracies on your experian report you can dispute it inside of you account securely online! What is 12.95 a month compared to what we spend for useless and needless items for more than that. America is too busy wasting 20.00 dollars or more at McDonalds fatening themselvesin a day, instead of something that truely matters; their credit history. You can also go to other memberships through the credit bureaus if you do not want to do it through FreeCreditReport.com. It is pretty obvious that consumers really need to take responsibilities for their own actions! If you put your credit card on the internet, is it not common sense that somewhere along the line you are going to be charged? Or does America want everything to be free?! Where do we as consumers cross the line?

Joana,

Since many buinesses are making a lot of money using OUR credit report information, congress thought it was only fair that we should get one free copy of OUR OWN INFORMATION a year.

I don’t think it is greedy at all to expect a free copy of our own information.

A good rule of thumb is the actual free credit reports will not ask for your credit card number unless you are trying to access something that costs money. Signing up for freecreditreport.com asks for it up front. Run away!

Unfortunately the government site doesn’t give the credit score. You’ll need to go to the Fico site to buy the Fico score.

I actually LIKE freecreditreport.com. I’ve been a subscriber for nearly 2 years now, and during that time I’ve opened/closed a few credit accounts. Each time, I get a notification from freecreditreport.com, usually within a few days of the activity, alerting me to the change. I also find it useful to see my credit “score” change over time, and they offer guidance on what factors in your credit report are affecting that score, positively or negatively.

It actually sounds like they’ve improved. Used to only give you 5 days to cancel. Then they billed me $79 anyway. Cheerfully refunded at the cost of only a week and an overdraft. Then they changed their mind and put a collection agency on me for twice as much who called to yell at me every day for a month.

At least one of the “free” credit reports was a year out of date, therefore useless or worse.

This is all brought to you by a company the nation trusts.

I just got ripped off by Free Credit Report Dummy me I signed up for one month free one month pay at 29.95 a month after that. I cancelled the report immediately. I got a bill for three sign ups They claim I did sign up three times. They will not take it off my credit card so I am stuck paying the whole thing