Credit Monitoring Services - Start here for Credit Repair

A credit monitoring service allows you to access your credit report at one or all 3 major credit bureaus. The typical service will also allow you to see your credit score initially and then at specified time periods. You can setup alerts to notify you of major changes to your credit file. This is could mean the possibility of Identity Theft. Many credit monitoring services even offer Identity Theft insurance just for signing up that helps to reimburse you monetarily for damages in case you’re a victim.

If you are in the process of repairing your credit you are going to need a copy of your credit report from each major credit bureau. When creditors report information to the credit bureaus about you they may or may not report to all 3 credit bureaus. This means that each credit bureau will have different credit history information about you. It is possible to have information in your credit report that doesn’t even belong to you. This can happen quite often to people that have common name spellings, like John Smith or Mary Jones. Even if you have a unique name, you need to scrutinize each detail on your credit reports from each credit bureau. You will be surprised how many mistakes you can find.

You can order your credit report from each credit bureau, but an easier solution is to order a 3 bureau credit report from just one service. The format of each report will be identical making it easier to spot the differences between each credit report.

As you begin the credit repair process, you will want to monitor your FICO score as it pertains to each credit bureau. The FICO score is the score most commonly used by lenders in approving credit applications. Each of the 3 major credit bureaus has its own FICO score based on the way it maintains credit information about consumers. For this reason you will want to know what your FICO score is at all 3 credit bureaus. As an example, if you apply for credit from ABC Credit Card knowing your FICO score at Experian is 725, but they check your FICO score at Trans Union which is 680, you may not get a favorable interest rate. The only service that provides FICO scores and credit reports from all 3 major credit bureaus is MyFICO, the consumer division of the company that created the FICO score. By monitoring your FICO score you will be able to determine if your efforts of credit repair are making any kind of impact.

When you have achieved good credit it is also a good idea to monitor your FICO scores and credit reports. You don’t want all that effort of establishing good credit to be wasted. And it’s much easier to keep good credit than to have to repair it all over again.

By setting up alert monitors you can be notified of major changes in your credit file via email. This can be a good indication someone is trying to steal your identity or that something else major has happened that requires your attention. It’s one of the great features of a credit monitoring service so take the time to set them up.

Most of the credit monitoring services offer Identity Theft insurance that can pay you up to $25,000 in damages incurred my stolen identity.