The Differences Between the Credit Bureaus

Posted by: Henry B. | Oct 23,2007


If you’ve ever read information about the major credit bureaus, you’ve likely seen mention of the big three: Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion.  There are literally thousands of credit bureaus across the country, but these are all subsets of one of the major bureaus.  You might have also seen that a credit report may be different via each credit reporting agency.  At Equifax, your credit rating might be 694, while Experian lists it at 682, and so on.  So what’s the difference and why does this happen?

First off, this discrepancy in scores is virtually guaranteed.  If you haven’t gone over your credit report in a long while, you should order a report from each bureau.  There may be credit anomalies on one, but not another.  Each credit bureau does not necessarily gather exactly the same information.  All are more established in certain cities and regions, meaning you should investigate where a bureau gathers the bulk of its information.  

In addition, each bureau gathers credit information differently.  For example, Experian uses the PLUS score method.  For my money, this is the best system available, as it’s easy for the layman to understand and interpret.  Credit reports can be pretty dense, especially for someone with a long history.   TransUnion and Equifax use a similar reporting model, but again this information may be taken from different regions.  

What it comes down to is that you need to keep tabs on each credit bureau's credit report.  Say you’re applying for a car loan and the lot needs to access your report.  If you’ve only erased inquiries from your Experian credit report, this will not be much help if the car lot accesses your Equifax report.  To make absolutely certain that your credit report is clean, you should go through each credit report separately.  

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