cancel
Showing results for 
Search instead for 
Did you mean: 

Credit Karma and TheWorkNumber

tag
MJ-san
Frequent Contributor

Credit Karma and TheWorkNumber

Going through a mortgage refi process, I pulled my own TheWorkNumber report to see what's being reported there and came across a somewhat disturbing discovery.

CreditKarma has been pulling my info every month for the last 6 months. 

I guess this falls into the "and other information" category.

"I understand that I am providing written instructions in accordance with the Fair Credit Reporting Act and other applicable law for Credit Karma or its affiliated companies to request and receive copies of consumer reports, scores and other information about me from third parties, including, but not limited to, TransUnion and Equifax"

Makes me question what they are doing with that info and if I want to maintain my CK account!

Message 1 of 9
8 REPLIES 8
Physh1
Frequent Contributor

Re: Credit Karma and TheWorkNumber

Are you active on CK? It's a free site that uses your info to target you with 'relevant' credit offers & gives you VS 3.0 updates at least once every 7 days. They would clearly need your info semi-regularly to do this....they are all soft pulls correct?

Message 2 of 9
MJ-san
Frequent Contributor

Re: Credit Karma and TheWorkNumber

Not sure how TWC reports pulls, but it is a site that reports paycheck data, not credit. CreditKarma doesn’t show any of that data back to me on the dashboard- just credit data, so that leads me to question what they are doing with it.
Message 3 of 9
Jnbmom
Credit Mentor

Re: Credit Karma and TheWorkNumber

Do you use CK? If so anytime you use their service they will do a SP.

EXP 780 EQ 791TU 795
Message 4 of 9
Anonymous
Not applicable

Re: Credit Karma and TheWorkNumber


@Jnbmom wrote:

Do you use CK? If so anytime you use their service they will do a SP.


Hi JNB.  I am guessing our OP realizes that each time he uses Karma it generates a soft pull.  But he was likely expecting that to be confined to TU and EQ, since the only data that Karma displays is from TU and EQ.

 

He'd be legitimately surprised if Karma was also pulling his IRS records, or his Experian data, or a history of his individual purchases at Citibank, or his criminal file (say).  I think that's what he's puzzled by.

Message 5 of 9
DaveInAZ
Senior Contributor

Re: Credit Karma and TheWorkNumber


@Anonymous wrote:

@Jnbmom wrote:

Do you use CK? If so anytime you use their service they will do a SP.


Hi JNB.  I am guessing our OP realizes that each time he uses Karma it generates a soft pull.  But he was likely expecting that to be confined to TU and EQ, since the only data that Karma displays is from TU and EQ.

 

He'd be legitimately surprised if Karma was also pulling his IRS records, or his Experian data, or a history of his individual purchases at Citibank, or his criminal file (say).  I think that's what he's puzzled by.


I don't know about MJ-san, but I would be legitimately royally p*ssed if CK was pulling that kind of info. I'd never heard of The Work Number, I see it's owned by Equifax - great, now the Russians and/or the Chinese probably have my employment & payroll info. Smiley Wink Actually, my employer is the local county government and I don't think they would report my payroll info to a private company, but I'm going to call and make sure.  I'm guessing an employer would have to disclose if they're reporting your payroll info to anyone other than the IRS?

And if I close my CK I'm assuming they would have to stop collecting any & all data on me? I'm thinking seriously of closing it, I get TU & EQ credit reports elsewhere, and even the useless Vantage scores elsewhere - if I wanted to bother.

 

EDIT: Just got off the phone with the county HR department: They don't report to The Work # or any other private company, and would  release my employment or payroll info only if they had a signed statement from me authorizing them to release that info. Yea.

 

EDIT2: I Googled CK's ToS: "I understand that my instructions let Credit Karma and affiliated companies obtain such information at any time for as long as I have a registered Credit Karma account" . My CK account is now closed. If they want to offer me useless Vantage scores & credit reports I can get straight from the source* in exchange for authorization to data mine anything they can get on me they can stuff it. FYI, to close your account you have to search for "close account" in their Help section, found under Your Profile. When you deactivate your account they tell you that you have to wait 6 months if you want to reactivate it.

*-"straight from the source": I have services directly from TU, EQ & EX

Message 6 of 9
Thomas_Thumb
Senior Contributor

Re: Credit Karma and TheWorkNumber

An employer does not need to notify you if they report info to the work number. Likely some sort of data sharing is a default condition of employment for companies that are in the WN network. 

 

People should get their own work number reports to see what's on them. I found a couple past employers on my report but, employment dates and salary information were inaccurate. None of my employers since 2004 were listed in the report. Perhaps because the companies have been privately owned and are not part of the Equifax WN network.

 

Have you ever seen executive pay summaries in your local paper? They publish that data yearly in our paper. Where do you think that comes from? Realize your personal data is out there - make no mistake about that.

 

BTW - Credit card companies share untold amounts of information with their affiliates. Most likely this will include any salary information you have shared when applying for credit and/or asking for CLIs.

Fico 9: .......EQ 850 TU 850 EX 850
Fico 8: .......EQ 850 TU 850 EX 850
Fico 4 .....:. EQ 809 TU 823 EX 830 EX Fico 98: 842
Fico 8 BC:. EQ 892 TU 900 EX 900
Fico 8 AU:. EQ 887 TU 897 EX 899
Fico 4 BC:. EQ 826 TU 858, EX Fico 98 BC: 870
Fico 4 AU:. EQ 831 TU 872, EX Fico 98 AU: 861
VS 3.0:...... EQ 835 TU 835 EX 835
CBIS: ........EQ LN Auto 940 EQ LN Home 870 TU Auto 902 TU Home 950
Message 7 of 9
DaveInAZ
Senior Contributor

Re: Credit Karma and TheWorkNumber

Oh yeah, unless you're a hermit living in a cave with no phone or property your info is out there.

Own your home? Title with your name & address is a public record.

Own a car? Title & registration with your name & address is a public record. I opened a bank account at Memory Bank recently and in the questions to verify identity was to select a car I have owned, they had my 2013 Mazda I owned until last year. And many states sell your Drivers License info, Arizona has an opt-out option which I took.

 

And so on. Lexis Nexis is the mother lode of personal info, this thread reminded me it's a been well over a year since I got my last LN report so I'm ordering another report, the amount of info they have on you is amazing.

 

It just ticked me off that CK uses your account to data mine on you for things unrelated to the score & report they provide you, and for what they provide me it's not worth it to me. And I think I know why they pull Work Number - to better match you with credit offers. But I'm not interested in their credit offers.

 

I'm not going to bother pulling my Work Number report, I worked overseas in the 80s & 90s, and then a privately owned company and now the local county government, so anything they have on me would be quite old and useless.

Message 8 of 9
MJ-san
Frequent Contributor

Re: Credit Karma and TheWorkNumber

CreditGuyInDixie- yup, totally expect CK is soft-pulling TU and EQ. It was the pulls to TWC that kind of freaked me out.

 

There is _NO_ info on their site or in their agreement that they do it - just the standard "and others" and "not limited to" language in the Ts&Cs. 

 

They don't use that data in any way to show DTI% ... I'm assuming it's used when they present offers based on credit score/info and now income. 

Most people don't know about or understand the "other" credit reporting agencies - TWN and LN specifically. 

I can say that the info on my TWN is woefully inaccurate - the reported income number last year was 2x higher... and the numbers appear to be net, not gross, so all of those lovely tax-saving deductions for health, FSA, 401k, etc. aren't accounted for. 

I have never used an offer from CK and based on the Ts&Cs they don't use the data other than to present offers (i.e. they don't market it otherwise). Still... don't like it.

Message 9 of 9
Advertiser Disclosure: The offers that appear on this site are from third party advertisers from whom FICO receives compensation.