Need help with "free" trial

[Anonymous]

I signed up for the so-called "free trial" a few days back on 2/27. I was pretty pleased with the product at first - very smooth, easy to use and understand, and quite efficient. That is, until I noticed two things.

First, a dollar was charged to the credit card I signed up with. I don't know what that is, but I signed up under the assumption that the trial subscription was free and without snags. While it's only a dollar, I don't believe in giving away free money either. Or letting other people take it from you without permission.

Second, I only got one score report. As I understand it, you need score reports to make score watch actually work - kind of misleading in my opinion, as each score report costs a whopping $15 on top of membership prices if I were to continue with my subcription beyond the trial (that whole bait and switch routine). This is pretty irritating, and I'd like to get my second "free" score report - if it is in fact free, before I cancel my subscription.

Anyone care to shed some light?

[MePlusThree]

No help here but 1. I thought you got 2 scores/reports also and you don't. 2. Your credit report doesn't really help since you can't see what account numbers etc are. Waste of time. I hope I don't have as much trouble canceling as many have!

[Gunnar419]

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@Anonymous wrote:

I signed up for the so-called "free trial" a few days back on 2/27. I was pretty pleased with the product at first - very smooth, easy to use and understand, and quite efficient. That is, until I noticed two things.

First, a dollar was charged to the credit card I signed up with. I don't know what that is, but I signed up under the assumption that the trial subscription was free and without snags. While it's only a dollar, I don't believe in giving away free money either. Or letting other people take it from you without permission.

Second, I only got one score report. As I understand it, you need score reports to make score watch actually work - kind of misleading in my opinion, as each score report costs a whopping $15 on top of membership prices if I were to continue with my subcription beyond the trial (that whole bait and switch routine). This is pretty irritating, and I'd like to get my second "free" score report - if it is in fact free, before I cancel my subscription.

Anyone care to shed some light?

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 I'm also a fairly recent subscriber who took a paid subscription after the free trial.

1.) It is a free trial; I believe that dollar won't actually be charged against your card if you cancel.

2.) I was confused about the second free ScoreWatch report, too. Mine suddenly showed up after I switched to a paid subscription.

I don't think MyFico's trying to defraud anybody, but I do think they could communicate more clearly about product terms. Good luck.

[llecs]

Mods don't have access to your personal info and only went once through the subscription process once several years ago with renewals each year, but I'll take a stab...

The dollar is a temporary authorization. It's there to make sure the CC is valid. It's just like renting a car or paying at the pump, you'll sometimes see a $1 transaction first. When the purchase goes through, then you'll see the charge and the $1 goes away. So, if you cancel by 10 days, then that'll have disappeared, if not sooner.

I think it mentions when you go for the free trial that you only start with one report, and if you pay for the subscription, you can get a 2nd and that lasts for the rest of the year. It's not an unlimited amount of reports with the service. The service's basis is the monitoring aspect of it and if you have the trial now, then you could be alerted for changes to your report and even alerted to score changes provided your score did change. I'm with you though, I wish everything were free. I own a couple businesses and would love my employees to work for free, but I don't think I'll have any luck in that department. 

[728sofar]

Yes, I was also mislead by the advertising and page i read Very carefully, thinking I would be able to see more than one (1) score over the 10 day free trial.   I think this might be done on purpose, to lure us in and hope we forget in 10 days to try to figure out how to cancel it.
In regards to other comments on this thread----wha?
I have a marvelous work ethic, i do not expect "everything for free"  (?? wha?)
and i am generally a VERY skeptical person!!!!!!!   But, the front page does indeed, say "free" 10 day trial.   A trial  being something one can typically explore the site and use the features, for "free".

but, because MyFICO is so so highly regarded,
when a site like MyFICO says you can use the site for 10 days "free", i did foolishly believe them also.  It takes careful reading to realize, as one clicks along, that yes, even MyFICO is misleading all but the most skeptical    Any other business, I would not have been so easily fooled, but, it WAS "MyFICO" which I did hold in high regard as a reliable and ethical website.
(which, it generally IS, except for the misleading use of the word "FREE" and the word "TRIAL" as the words are commonly understood.

Now, being a penny-pincher that Clark Howard would be proud of, now i am trying to decide if i want the $4.95 x 3 mos product that DOES include the Transunion fico score too, OR,
just plunk out the $20 for my transunion score.....
BY THE WAY,
DOES ANYONE KNOW WHICH SCORE IS MOST OFTEN USED BY FLORIDA REALTORS?
Equifax or Transunion?  

Does MyFICO even offer the 3rd credit score, Experian?  I didn't see it as an option ...so far....


btw,  the $1 is most definitely taken out, not run as some type of "test".   I have signed up for online banking alerts and I got a notice immediately that someone took $1 out.  No big deal, but, they *should* warn those of us that DO monitor their credit cards, that there WILL be a tiny fee after all.   It's only ethical, imo, to tell people you will make a charge onto their acct, to save us time from having check out who is into my acct now...

[728sofar]

I did decide to go on with the $4.95 Quarterly FICO monitoring (apparently, this is ONLY with Transunion...not entirely sure yet, but, seems to be the case)
but, this has added plus of some ID theft alerts could be sent to me.  I have signed up to get an email every week about my status, whether or not there are any "ID theft alerts" ------------------as during several months, I will be handing out my info as I apply for new home, new job, in new town.  

  Whole lotta people I do not know will have access to my info for a while here, so this product seemed a good pick for ME at this particular time.  I wonder if this is actually a very good product, though, if it will actually catch any ID theft if anyone does attempt to run up some bills in my name......hmmm.

Also, it gave me my TU fico score, which is 737!!       WHOO-HOO!!  

Now, i just need to find a good secure way to get my Experian FICO score....i can't find such a link on this site.     darn...

[EaglesFan2006]

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@728sofar wrote:

Yes, I was also mislead by the advertising and page i read Very carefully, thinking I would be able to see more than one (1) score over the 10 day free trial.   I think this might be done on purpose, to lure us in and hope we forget in 10 days to try to figure out how to cancel it.
In regards to other comments on this thread----wha?
I have a marvelous work ethic, i do not expect "everything for free"  (?? wha?)
and i am generally a VERY skeptical person!!!!!!!   But, the front page does indeed, say "free" 10 day trial.   A trial  being something one can typically explore the site and use the features, for "free".

but, because MyFICO is so so highly regarded,
when a site like MyFICO says you can use the site for 10 days "free", i did foolishly believe them also.  It takes careful reading to realize, as one clicks along, that yes, even MyFICO is misleading all but the most skeptical    Any other business, I would not have been so easily fooled, but, it WAS "MyFICO" which I did hold in high regard as a reliable and ethical website.
(which, it generally IS, except for the misleading use of the word "FREE" and the word "TRIAL" as the words are commonly understood.

Now, being a penny-pincher that Clark Howard would be proud of, now i am trying to decide if i want the $4.95 x 3 mos product that DOES include the Transunion fico score too, OR,
just plunk out the $20 for my transunion score.....
BY THE WAY,
DOES ANYONE KNOW WHICH SCORE IS MOST OFTEN USED BY FLORIDA REALTORS?
Equifax or Transunion?  

Does MyFICO even offer the 3rd credit score, Experian?  I didn't see it as an option ...so far....


btw,  the $1 is most definitely taken out, not run as some type of "test".   I have signed up for online banking alerts and I got a notice immediately that someone took $1 out.  No big deal, but, they *should* warn those of us that DO monitor their credit cards, that there WILL be a tiny fee after all.   It's only ethical, imo, to tell people you will make a charge onto their acct, to save us time from having check out who is into my acct now...

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The dollar is a pre-authorization, which does show like it is deducted from your available balance/credit.  However, it will be returned in anywhere from 3-10 days depending on the processing time of your bank.  Agreed that it would be nice if that was made more clear, but that's what it is.