Tips to increase your score
Ways to Increase Your Credit Rating
Before getting to that, we have to know how the whole credit industry works, and some things you need to know.
Most people don’t think to check their credit report often, assuming everything is all right. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Your identity could be stolen, but don’t depend on the credit reporting agencies to give you a call. How would they even know? They just collect and report their findings.
Credit bureaus are companies that gather and sell information about a person’s credit data. They sell credit data on consumers to banks, mortgage industry credit card companies, department stores, auto dealers, insurance industry, property owners, and any employers. In turn the above companies use the data to decide on applications for credit, any insurance, housing, and even employment.
Credit bureaus also provide identifying data about a consumer’s name, address, prior address, work place and former employment information to government entities. If a government entity is considering giving credit, checking the status of an account, or trying to collect a debt, giving a license or other any benefit, the government entity will get the credit report.
The 3 major bureaus are:
- Equifax (http://equifax.com)
- Experian (http://experian.com)
- Transunion (http://Transunion.com)
And a new company, Innovis (http://innovis.com), has come to the scene recently.
There are also many affiliate credit reporting agencies, which are mostly run or controlled by the 3 major bureaus.