Identity theft and credit card fraud are a frightening reality in today’s electronic world. Most people become victims during the holiday months so this article shows you what to do to keep yourself safe and also how to keep your ratings great. You should always check your credit card statements for reasons such as errors, identity theft, credit ratings and interest rates.

How often should I check?
You should always check your credit if you plan to make a significant purchase. At least six months before will give you adequate time to correct any errors or help improve your rating.
If you have been refused credit for any reason and want to improve your score. Remember that you are eligible for a free credit ratings check after any refusal and this will give you details as to where you went wrong.

Annually is also a good idea as things may slip by without you knowing before it’s too late. Also, if you suspect some has stolen your identity and is happily shopping on your hard earned money, examine your statements and take suitable action.

Did you know that everybody is eligible for free annual credit check? The three companies that provide this service are TransUnion, Experian and Equifax. Remember though, it is best to order one check and wait for a certain period before ordering the next as that way you can have checks throughout the year and spot errors easier. One thing that these companies will not tell you is that they each provide different pieces of information so make sure you cover all three.

There are a few ways in which you can order your free annual report. Via telephone by dialing the following number; 1-877-322-8228, or if you prefer, by sending a postal application to Annual Credit Report Request Service, PO Box 105281, Atlanta, GA 30348-5281.

Alternatively and sometimes more conveniently is the option to go to the website to order your free credit check. Be aware that there is only one authorized site on the internet that provides this service, so don’t be tempted by scams or fraudsters. The official website for this service is annualcreditreport.com.

If you have never ordered a credit report before you can order all three by going to myfico.com. If you don’t want to be a victim of fraud and would like to keep your credit rating at a good level, you should always check your credit score, especially after the festive seasons.

Back in the day, “humans” were the ones who decided someone’s credit worthiness. All you needed was a handshake. But times have changed, and now a single number (your FICO credit score) decides whether you’ll get a loan or not.

75% of all financial institutions use the FICO credit scoring system. It was created by the Fair Isaac Company. You can go to Myfico.com, and get your credit reports and scores from all 3 major credit bureaus. They are Experian, TransUnion, and Equifax.

Your FICO score will determine how much credit your approved for and at what interest rate. So monitoring your credit score can help

you save on interest when applying for loans.

Improving your credit score, or maintaining it doesn’t have to be difficult. It will just take some time to implement some of the steps.

Here are three strategies to maintain or boost your credit score.

Strategy One: Establish a Credit History

There could be various reasons you don’t have a credit history. Maybe you’re fresh out of high school. Maybe you only use cash, and never needed a loan. Most likely, if you have no credit history, your FICO score will be low.

The easiest way to obtain a credit history, is through an installment loan. Paying an installment loan on time can improve your score faster than paying off a credit card.

If you have $1000 to work with, here’s a great way to establish a credit history. First, take $1000 to a bank, and open a 6 month CD account. Then, apply for an installment loan for $1000, using the CD as collateral. Now, here’s what you do. Take the $1000 loan, and open another 6 month CD at another bank. Get another loan for $1000 from the second bank. Do all the steps again at one more bank.

You will now have 3 loans to pay off. Pay the minimum amount for 6 months. In the final month, cash out your CD’s and pay the loans off in full. You will have established a credit history in just 6 months.

Strategy Two: Maintain Your Good Credit History

You have a steady job. You don’t have high credit card debt, and you pay your bills on time. Here are some tips to keep your credit score from going down.

First off, don’t close your old accounts. Closing old accounts will remove how much total credit you have available, and can lower your credit score.

Second, if you pay your credit cards in full, you may have to watch when you pay on them monthly. For example: You have a $5000 limit credit card. Every month, you charge about $1200 to that card, and you pay it off in full. But here’s what can happen to you. Your credit card company reports your credit info monthly to the credit bureaus. If they report it before you pay off your card, it can look like you carry a balance on your credit card every month. You may find that your FICO score will improve if you pay on your credit cards at a different time of the month.

Strategy Three: Repair Your Poor Credit History

If you have poor credit, there are some things you can do to boost your credit score. It will take some time to accomplish this.

The first step to repairing your credit is to pay all of your bills on time. You’ll want to establish a good payment history. Your mortgage is the most important to pay on time. Installment loans are next, and then credit cards.

After that, you need to reduce the percentage of credit that you are currently using. Paying down the revolving credit debt that you have will improve your credit score.

One last thing is to look for errors in your credit report. Get a copy of your credit report from all three major credit bureaus from Myfico.com. Look them over for any errors, and contact your creditors to remove any negative items.

Your credit score is vital to your financial health, and implementing these strategies may help boost your credit score. Please consult with a financial advisor about all concerns of your finances.

A, B, C, D, or F? What’s your grade? Similarly, just like in school, you are being graded on your credit performance. However, unlike schools you are not told what you are being graded on. The Fico score is your credit report card. The first thing that needs to be done before you can begin to improve your credit grade is to find out what grade you are starting with.

When it comes to your credit report card, there are six things that you must choose to do on a regular basis, that is, check it, compare it, track it, build it, protect it and repair it.

Check It – Know your FICO score and the factors affecting it. Your FICO scores are the credit scores most lenders use to determine your credit risk. You have multiple FICO scores, one from each credit bureau (Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion). It is crucial to note that each bureau may have different information.

Compare It – Monitor your credit report at least four times a year. The worse time to discover a problem with your credit report is when you go to obtain credit for that new car, mortgage, or vacation. Also, trends can also help identity spending patterns, both good and bad.

Track It – Tracking is an essential component to maintain and achieve a good credit score. You can set up alerts to receive changes to your report automatically. There are three main credit bureaus that manage credit records, Experian, Equifax and TransUnion.

Build It – Establishing a satisfactory credit history has never been as important as it is today. Two most influential factors in your scores are, whether you pay your bills on time and how much of your available credit you actually use. Don’t charge more than 30% of the card’s limit. Don’t charge more than you can pay off in a month.

Protect It- Make sure you pay the bill, and all your other bills, on time. Also, you can use a credit monitoring service that will give you with quarterly updates.

Repair It – How Will a Letter Help Me Fix my Credit?

According to The Fair Reporting Credit Act if an account is not being reported 100% accurately, by law the bureau must delete it from your file, within 30 days of your dispute. The majority of negative information is deleted using the dispute method. Here is how the process works.

If the bureaus cannot verify the accuracy of any account you dispute, they MUST remove the account within 30 days of receiving your dispute. It’s the law.

The first (and most crucial step) is to order a copy of your credit reports from http://www.myfico.com and reviewed them for errors and negative information that has caused your credit scores to drop. Disputing negative information on your credit report is the most effective method to increase your FICO Score.

Afterwards, make a list of disputed accounts so they are separated from your good accounts. Make sure that you arrange these accounts so that the oldest record is listed first and the newest is listed last.

Then, when you find errors or out dated information on your report, you want to write a hand written credit dispute letter for the first two accounts to each credit bureau that is reporting negative information on this account. This is necessary because there are three bureaus and they all report differently. So, you want to make sure that you are not sending a dispute letter to a bureau that is not reporting negatively about you! If you are confused by this, 30 Days to a Better Credit Report covers this process and other techniques quite well, so having a copy will help you tremendously.

The largest platforms for obtaining credit reports are

Experian Equifax and Trans Union

All three credit bureaus allow you to purchase your credit scores directly from them, or the alternative is to visit myFICO.com where you can purchase your scores directly form there for each credit bureau.

There is another service that you can use to roughly estimate how your score will look and that is at annualcreditreports.com. This site allows you to get a free copy of your credit reports from each of the three credit bureaus every 12 month period. While this will not give you your actual score, you can look through the reports to get an idea of what your credit score will be like.

The determining factors for your FICO score are outlined below:

Payment History Debt ratio Length of Credit History Types of Credit Number of Credit Inquiries

By looking through your credit reports and seeing how these sections measure up you can get an indication of your what your score may look like. The actual FICO score themselves are only available to purchase and are not supplied free of charge.

When you looking to obtain an actual FICO score then the only viable option would be to visit MyFICO.com where you have the option to purchase your credit scores from each of the big three credit reporting agencies at a discounted bulk price or individually.

The scores can also be obtained from each credit reporting agency directly through their own websites.

There is a lot of debate around the FICO and FAKO scoring models which is why people opt to go through FICO themselves to obtain the credit scores. Typically a FAKO score is considered to be a credit score that is obtained from a different source other than FICO which could be a credit score purchased from Experian.com or any other site similar that provides their own version of a credit score and have their own range. The maximum FICO score is 850, while with Experian the maximum score is 999.

In order to obtain the correct score sometimes the best way is going through the lender as they all use different credit bureaus for their credit checks. If you get denied credit for any reason you can ask the lender to provide you with a copy of the details that they used to get to their decision. This way they will release the data about your credit reports as well as the scores you have with the credit bureau that they used and information on which part of the credit report it was that got your application denied.

By obtaining the details this way the negative parts of your credit report are already identified and therefore if you can take action to get that item deleted, then you can raise your credit score without much difficulty.

By obtaining the details in this way you can get to know which credit bureau the company uses for their credit checks and use this for future reference as you can get the credit report and/or score from the credit bureau and work on improving it by having negative items deleted, lowering your debt-ratio and things like that. Once you have done a bit of work to repair that particular credit report you will be in a better position to obtain credit from that company at a later date.