Cheapest way to have it ALL!?!?

[MattH]

What's the absolute cheapest way to absolutely have all relevant information on all my reports all the time? Myfico is the only way I know about to see FICO scores, not FAKO scores, on all three reports, Truecredit is the only way I know to get anytime access to all three reports, but TC does not give genuine FICO scores and neither shows the SOFT inquiries, to the best of my knowledge softs only can be seen on reports obtained directly from the CRAs themselves. My current practice is, I subscribe to Quarterly Monitoring on myfico, I pull my free reports at the government-mandated www.annualcreditreport.com website once a year to see all the softs, and I save all my reports as Acrobat PDF files on my own computer so I can view any past report whenever I want to.

Incidentally, the Federal Trade Commission says the following about the various misleading "free but not really free" sites promoted by the CRAs:

http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/conline/edcams/freereports/index.html

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) advises consumers who order their free annual credit reports online to be sure to correctly spell annualcreditreport.com, or link to it from the FTC’s website to avoid being misdirected to other websites that offer supposedly free reports,but only with the purchase of other products. While consumers may be offered additional products or services while on the authorized website, they are not required to make a purchase to receive their free annual credit reports.

The FTC has received complaints from consumers who thought they were ordering their free annual credit report online. Some consumers responded to TV ads, email offers, or simply searched online.

The FTC recently settled a lawsuit against Consumerinfo.com – which did business as Experian Consumer Direct – over the “free credit report” promotion it advertised on television, radio and the Internet, including its websites freecreditreport.com and consumerinfo.com. If you ordered a free credit report from Consumerinfo between November 1, 2000 and September 15, 2003, and were enrolled in its credit monitoring program, you may be eligible for a refund under the FTC’s settlement.

[haulingthescoreup]

Well, you summed it up nicely. It's going to be a patchwork, whatever you do.

Everyone has their own version, but here's mine.

I have TrueCredit, an Experian-only version of CreditSecure through USAA, Scorewatch through myFICO, Suze through myFICO, and Equifax Credit Watch Gold.

To frequently monitor reports:

TC and the EX service. I could lose the EX monitoring service, but it's just $5.50/month through USAA, and I pay it automatically through my Sears MC. I hope that this annoys the fire out of Sears MC.

To monitor full reports with softs:

I use the backdoor to access the full TU and EX reports when I want to see who's looking. I do this about once a month, I suppose.

EQ Credit Watch Gold lets me pull full EQ reports daily, softs and all, for $9.95/ month, I think it is, and it's a great product with access to a separate consumer helpline. They give lots of useful info: average age in years and months, util broken down by revolving, mortgage, and loans.

To monitor FICO scores:

Scorewatch plus Suze. With Suze, you can choose which report to pull and when, so you can elect to pull TU and then EX six weeks later, or whatever. SW has its moments, some of them extended, but it does allow me to keep an eye on EQ FICO. Technically, I don't have to pull the full reports, as the alert itself tells me what the score is.

It ain't cheap, but if you want daily access + ability to see full reports + all 3 FICO's, it's the best I've been able to figure out.

Note: I know that the AmEx crowd loves CreditSecure, but it has always looked kindergarten-ish to me. But it does have the advantage of allowing you to pull more frequently than every 24 hours plus 1 minute.

Ooooo, I always love these threads!

[MattH]

Thanks for the explanation, it sounds like as you say, it's gonna be a patchwork whatever you do.

I have thought for some years the US ought to give us better legal protections of our privacy than we have, but the European approach ain't the right one either: over there it's so difficult for companies to exchange information that even legitimate transactions which actually benefit the consumer can be impeded. I'm not sure what the best approach is, but pretty clearly we ain't got it here in the USA. Any system in which people must parse complex rules and take action themselves with care and sophistication in order to protect their rights is a system in which many people get ripped off by errors and deceptive marketing because they don't understand their rights.

[Red1Blue]

I use truecredit and creditsecure from amex. It costs me about 27 or so per month and I can check all 3 credit reports every day. Eventually, I am going to drop one of them. Not sure which one yet. I pull fico once every 2 months or so. Soon, I'll start pulling once 6 months or so on Fico.

[smallfry]

Zee backdoor? What is thees backdoor?

[MattH]

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@smallfry wrote:
Zee backdoor? What is thees backdoor?

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Inquiring minds want to know!

[smallfry]

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@MattH wrote:

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@smallfry wrote:
Zee backdoor? What is thees backdoor?

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Inquiring minds want to know!

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[haulingthescoreup]

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@MattH wrote:

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@smallfry wrote:
Zee backdoor? What is thees backdoor?

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Inquiring minds want to know!

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From Timothy:

http://ficoforums.myfico.com/fico/board/message?board.id=rebuildingcredit&message.id=12365#M12365

[Anonymous]

Should we be broadcasting this backdoor information directly in the forum threads?  We certainly don't want to lose the privilege if people start abusing it, right?

I think this should be a PM-only thing.   Abuse it, and we will all lose it.

[Scamp]

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@haulingthescoreup wrote:

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@MattH wrote:

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@smallfry wrote:
Zee backdoor? What is thees backdoor?

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Inquiring minds want to know!

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From Timothy:

http://ficoforums.myfico.com/fico/board/message?board.id=rebuildingcredit&message.id=12365#M12365

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HTSU, do the CRA's not get hostile or track things like us 'abusing' the online dispute option by repeatedly using it to get to our reports for free but then never actually filing a dispute (or rarely)?

I've sneaked in EX's dispute-link 'back door' a few times on CS, but TU makes one jump through so many hoops to get to a report that I've always sissied out with that one, mostly fearing the above and thinking I'd end up with an FA or just not allowed to use online dispute anymore (whereupon I figure something'd show up that I REALLY needed to dispute ASAP and the option would be gone).

I guess what I'm asking is, "Is this really a safe way to sneak peeks?"