Other Helpful Things about A Credit Report

Posted by: Gene M. | Jan 13,2008


The main reason people emphasize ordering your obligatory free credit report once a year is to make sure that there are no recent identity theft actions listed on your report.  This will be seen in there being a new credit card account listed, for example, which you didn’t apply for yourself.  

The other major benefit of a credit report is erasing old inaccuracies that still might remain on the report.  If I’m talking to you as a Boomer-aged person than it’s likely (hopefully) that you’ve erased these inaccuracies in the past.  Once you’ve erased the inaccuracies, they’re gone, so it’s a one-time deal.  If you’ve totally been avoiding the issue for decades on end, this is reason number one why you’ve got to order up your credit report right away.  Did I mention that it’s free?  There’s no reason not to.  The only reason I could think of is that you’re worried about what the report might say and ignorance is bliss.  

One major reason to get a credit report is to see if you have indeed been timely with your payments.  It is not uncommon for people to think they’ve been responsible with bill payments only to see that they’ve actually defaulted.  Just sending off a bill a day in advance is not sufficient.  Bills can be delayed and there could just be clerical error when you pay so close to the deadline.  What you may need to dispute, aside from out-of-date listings, are these types of inaccurate defaults.  However, it’s just as likely that the defaults are legitimate and you didn’t get the bill in on time.  

Checking your credit report can give you a bird’s-eye view of your entire credit situation – not just one particular bill at a time.  This is how a credit report can be helpful in real time, rather than just gauging how you’ve been performing in the last couple of decades.

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