All About Credit

The Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act of 2003 (FACTA) made it possible for you to get a free copy of your credit report. You can order a free copy of your credit report from each of the three major credit bureaus – Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion – each year. You should take advantage of this privilege by ordering your credit report and using it to monitor your credit history.

You can order a free credit report online, by visiting www.annualcreditreport.com or by phone by calling 877-322-8228.

Below are a few things that can negatively affect your credit score:

• Paying late - thirty-five percent of your credit score is your payment history.
• Not paying at all
• An account sent to collections - a collection status shows that the creditor gave up trying to get payment from you and hired someone else to do it.
• Defaulting on a loan
• Filing bankruptcy
• Foreclosure
• Credit judgement - the court had to get involved to make you pay the debt.
• High credit card balances - (relative to your credit limit) increases your credit utilization and decreases your credit score.
• Maxed out credit cards - this make your credit utilization 100%

But WAIT! Here are some things that DON'T affect your credit score:

• Bank Overdrafts - as long as they are settled before going into collections
• Your income (salary)
• Insurance payments - Even though they use your credit score to make decisions about you, they don’t report your timely or untimely payments to the credit bureaus. Insurance payments won’t affect your credit score.
• Child support and alimony
• Utility and cell phone payments
• Rent payments
• Checking your own credit
• Your interest rate
• Obtaining credit counseling
• Your age

You can improve your credit score by improving your payment history and keeping debt to a minimum.