When to get 2nd free annual report?

[Subexistence]

http://www.thequarterroll.com/Blog/2011/February-2011/second-free-annual-credit-report.htm

I'm in Maryland so when should I get my 2 reports?

[Anonymous]

I would wait on getting a full-blown report like this for whenever it is that you actually need all those features.  As far as I know, there are three reasons to get a full-blown report (like the kind that one gets from annualCreditReport.com, for example):

(1)  Because you have a huge interest in seeing who is doing soft inquries on you

(2)  Because you have a big interest in seeing the trended data that your issuers may be reporting.

(3)  Because something really disturbing is coming up on the reports you are getting from Credit Karma or Credit Check Total or WalletHub or whatever, and you need to make sure that the reports you get directly from the CRA say the same thing.

To give you an idea of how often one of these events happens, I have not pulled any of my full reports from ACR (or the CRA) in the last three years.  None of those three things have happened in my life.  And I live in a state (Georgia) that permits THREE free pulls annually.  I just use the free tools that are out there to pull my reports whenever I want to see them (Karma, etc.).

So the answer is... if any of those three apply to you, then do it.  If they don't, then don't.

[Subexistence]

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@Anonymous wrote:

I would wait on getting a full-blown report like this for whenever it is that you actually need all those features.  As far as I know, there are three reasons to get a full-blown report (like the kind that one gets from annualCreditReport.com, for example):

(1)  Because you have a huge interest in seeing who is doing soft inquries on you

(2)  Because you have a big interest in seeing the trended data that your issuers may be reporting.

(3)  Because something really disturbing is coming up on the reports you are getting from Credit Karma or Credit Check Total or WalletHub or whatever, and you need to make sure that the reports you get directly from the CRA say the same thing.

To give you an idea of how often one of these events happens, I have not pulled any of my full reports from ACR (or the CRA) in the last three years.  None of those three things have happened in my life.  And I live in a state (Georgia) that permits THREE free pulls annually.  I just use the free tools that are out there to pull my reports whenever I want to see them (Karma, etc.).

So the answer is... if any of those three apply to you, then do it.  If they don't, then don't.

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I've never seen a soft inquiry before since my free reports thus far don't show them. What do you specifically mean by trended data?

[Anonymous]

I just googled trended data and found a lot of good articles:

https://www.google.com/search?q=trended+data&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8

[HeavenOhio]

The term trended data refers to your month-by month payment amounts.Those viewing your report can see how much you've actually used your card and how much you've paid over a period of time. Equifax and Experian show these numbers going back 24 months. TransUnion goes back 30 months. Not all cards report this level of detail. Instead of a number, you'll see something like "no data."

Below are some samples of trended data from Experian. I chose Experian because it's the easiest copy/paste.

Here you can see that my Nov. 2016 balance of $549 was paid in full the following month.

Date: account balance / date payment received / scheduled payment amount / actual amount paid
Dec 2016: $19 / Nov 14, 2016 / $19 / $549
Nov 2016: $549 / Nov 01, 2016 / $25 / $165

In this sample, I'm paying down a card with a 0% interest promo. You can see that I'm paying well above the minimum and that my balance is heading downward.

Date: account balance / date payment received / scheduled payment amount / actual amount paid
Dec 2016: $685 / Dec 19, 2016 / $27 / $388
Nov 2016: $1,338 / Nov 14, 2016 / $44 / $2,115
Oct 2016: $3,453 / Oct 19, 2016 / $113 / No data

This is a sample of a card that doesn't report trended data:

Date: account balance / date payment received / scheduled payment amount / actual amount paid
Dec 2016: $1,386 / Dec 12, 2016 / $25 / No data
Nov 2016: $500 / Nov 16, 2016 / $25 / No data

[Subexistence]

Which cards are known to report trended data?

[HeavenOhio]

Captial One and Chase don't. Barclays, Wells Fargo, and Synchrony do. I have AMEX, but because I haven't pulled a full report since I got the card, I don't know what it does.

[Anonymous]

I will pull an EQ report via ACR in Aug and report what I see as far as TD.  At that point my most recent cards (a BOA and Chase) will have had time to report TD if they do at all  My feeling is that cards that are less than 120 days old are a dirty test tube: if they don't show TD data it may mean that the issuer hasn't yet started to do it on a card that young.

I will have at that point cards with the following issuers:

   * BOA (4)

   * Chase (2)

   * Citi (3)

   * Amex (2)

   * Elan (1)

All of them will be 180+ days old at that point.

[Subexistence]

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@Anonymous wrote:

I will pull an EQ report via ACR in Aug and report what I see as far as TD.  At that point my most recent cards (a BOA and Chase) will have had time to report TD if they do at all  My feeling is that cards that are less than 120 days old are a dirty test tube: if they don't show TD data it may mean that the issuer hasn't yet started to do it on a card that young.

I will have at that point cards with the following issuers:

   * BOA (4)

   * Chase (2)

   * Citi (3)

   * Amex (2)

   * Elan (1)

All of them will be 180+ days old at that point.

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Do ACR operate on anniversary year or calendar year? 

[Anonymous]

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@Subexistence wrote:

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Do ACR operate on anniversary year or calendar year? 

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Great question.  I asked an ACR customer service rep this question 3-4 years ago and she said that you have wait a full 365 days before you can pull that bureau's report.  Do bear in mind that this conversation was quite a while ago and ACR could have changed its policy.

These links seeems to bear out the 365 day theory:

https://www.creditkarma.com/question/free-credit-report-every-calendar-year-or-only-every-12-months

http://ficoforums.myfico.com/t5/Rebuilding-Your-Credit/Free-annual-credit-report-1x-per-calendar-yea...

Those links are 3-4 years old.

On the other hand I have also seen a number of articles by journalists that typically are published in Nov/Dec that say something like: Be sure to grab you credit reports before the end of this year, so that you are taking advantage of your once a year report at ACR.

Such articles are clearly premised on the idea that you can get a report in Dec and another in Feb.