Have you checked your credit report lately? You might have heard that you can get one free credit report from each of the three major credit bureaus — TransUnion, Experian, and Equifax — every year. If you haven’t gotten your report yet from each of them, go to this website and grab yours before the year ends: www.annualcreditreport.com.
Notice that the word “free” doesn’t appear in that address. There are many other sites pretending to be the official site where you can get your credit report for free, and many of them include the word “free” in their address. However, they’re actually going to try charging you money for something, usually a worthless credit monitoring service, before giving you anything.
This report will not include your “credit score,” or your FICO score. It will only show you what credit accounts you have open, such as loans, credit cards, and your credit history. It’s still good to check your credit file occasionally to make sure there aren’t any open accounts that aren’t yours and that all the information is correct. If someone has opened a credit card pretending to be you, you’ll most likely find it on your credit report.
So go and check it out while it’s free! On January 1, you’ll be able to check all three for free again anytime in 2014.