Credit Loan > Free Credit Report > The Truth about Your Absolutely Free Credit Report

Not All Credit Reports are Actually Free

The only way to get an absolutely free credit report is to order your credit report through the governmentally endorsed website annualcreditreport.com. This website was set up after the federal trade commission passed the Fair Credit Reporting Act, and it is the only website that has been endorsed by the government and the trade commission itself. If you look up free reports on the FTC website, you will be taken to a page that advertises and sings the praises of annualcreditreport.com. This website allows you to request one free copy of your credit report from each of the three major credit reporting agencies once every 12 months.

Some people try to get copies of their credit reports free in other ways. One woman said that she would have a friend of hers pull up her credit report every month or two so that she could double check it. Her friend worked as a mortgage broker and had access to information that she could not get by subscribing to a credit monitoring service. Unfortunately, because a third party pulled up her credit report, there was a mark (or "hit") listed on her report for each time the report was requested, which made it look like she was desperately trying to get credit from the bank. So, in that sense, her credit report was not actually an absolutely free credit report (though she never paid any money out of pocket for it).

Other people sign up to purchase credit monitoring subscriptions to help them check their scores every month. The subscription fee alone means that they are not getting an absolutely free credit report. Another down side to this option is that it is usually only the score that is free after the initial free report while additional reports are billed to the credit card that is on file.

That does not sound so bad until credit card bill comes, and you realize the charge for the report through the credit monitoring service is more than they would have paid directly to the credit reporting agency that actually issued the report. It might not seem fair that you can only get one absolutely free credit report each year but right now that is where the law stands. Thankfully, credit monitoring services are not expensive so that is certainly an option if you want to keep watch over your credit score and report.