Free Credit Reports - Really! By Federal Mandate!
This is sort of old-ish (in web terms anyway) news but it’s worth bringing up just in case you didn’t know about it. The Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) recently made it a national mandate that you are allowed to get your credit report, for free, every 12 months. There is a rollout period so that the three credit unions don’t get clobbered all at once. (Rollout map provided by the FTC, about mid-way on the page, you can’t miss it) By Sept. 1st, 2005, everyone will be able to get his or her credit reports once a year absolutely free.
Update: On June 1st, residents in “Southern States” will be eligible to receive free credit reports. Those states include: Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Texas. So far, residents of Western States (Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Utah, Washington, and Wyoming) and Midwestern States (Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, South Dakota, and Wisconsin) can already get free credit reports.
The three credit reporting agencies setup a single website, toll-free number and mailing address for all your requests to make it easier on you and on them.
Website: http://www.annualcreditreport.com
Phone: 1-877-322-8228
Address: Annual Credit Report Request Service, P.O. Box 105281, Atlanta, GA 30348-5281.
If you’ve never requested your credit report before, I suggest you go through the clearinghouse they’ve setup because you want to check them all for inaccuracies and errors. If you’ve requested them before and fixed all the errors, I would stagger the requests from each of the 3 agencies and get one every 4 or 5 months. Usually when something appears, it’ll appear on all three reports. By staggering your requests, you get three reports a year at three different points in time so you can essentially get 3 free reports a year. While not foolproof, this is a good way to take advantage of the freebie.
Contact Information for Each Agency:
Equifax
Phone: 800-685-1111
Website:http://www.equifax.com
Experian
Phone:888-EXPERIAN (888-397-3742)
Website:http://www.experian.com
Trans Union
Phone:800-916-8800
Website:http://www.transunion.com
As an FYI, residents of Colorado, Georgia, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and Vermont already get free reports and won’t need to wait for the mandate to be active in their areas.
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2 responses to “Free Credit Reports - Really! By Federal Mandate!”
risk responds:
Posted: May 18th, 2005 at 8:01 pm
before it becomes national mandate (still in process), the residents of a couple of pioneer states (yes! our state maryland is among them!) can claim free credit report at least once a year. I got mine last year. of course, it’s just a report, no scores
» 12 Credit Score Myths by Blueprint for Financial Prosperity responds:
Posted: December 7th, 2005 at 4:20 pm
[...] 8. I don’t need to check my credit report if I pay my bills on time. You make mistakes, I make mistakes, we all make mistakes - including the reporting agencies. It could be an error of omission (missing a nice revolving payment you’ve made, a score plus) or the addition of someone else’s derelict account. With free annual credit reports, there’s no reason why you should check them once a year. [...]