Talk:Credit history

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

From what I hear, there are two kinds of credit inquiries--"hard" and "soft", and they affect your credit history in different ways. Could someone more knowledgeable work this into the article?

Contents 1 Opt-Out 2 Job Application 3 Worldwide view 4 canada to usa 5 Domestic Issues 6 Multiple credit cards 7 annualcreditreport url

[edit] Opt-Out

I replaced the old opt-out with the opt-out info on FTC website. The old opt-out size seems a little phishy to me. It was registered with GoDaddy.

 You may opt out online by visiting https://www.optoutprescreen.com/

ERRONEOUS CREDIT REPORT One of our mortgage company erronously reported us that we were late on payment when we were not. When we purchase the house we were provided with payment coupon and we have been paying it on time. Late December, they change the payment coupon with our notice and we continue paying the old payment coupon and they reported us late. What can we do about it. Help

ANSWER TO ERRONEOUS CREDIT REPORT You need to demand from them the Financial History and Memo Lines from your account. This will make them have to prove why they are reporting you late and then you will be able to, through bank statements or cancelled cheques, that you infact were always paying on time. This information can be forwarded to the credit agencies if the company refuses to provide you with a letter stating the late payment is in error.

HARD & SOFT INQUIRIES HARD INQUIRIES - They are when you apply for credit for anything (including a cell phone, overdraft, or credit limit increase, etc.) They cost you points on your Beacon or FICO Score. About 2-5 on average if you do no more than 3 per year. If you do more they can increase in points. They show on both your personal Credit Report and the one a company pulls to approve you for credit. They can make the difference between being approved for lending or not, if you have done too many.

SOFT INQUIRIES - They do not show on a Credit Report that a company pulls. Only shows when you pull your own report. They include your name everytime you have requested your own Credit Report. They are done by companies checking to see if you are viable and a good credit risk for their products (including credit limit increases, new credit card, etc), especially when they don't have your permission to pull a Hard Inquiry. These do not cost you points.

[edit] Job Application

I'd like to see discussion of how employers and landlords might access (with permission, probably) credit reports for potential employees or tenants.

[edit] Worldwide view

Some (probably many) of the points noted in this article apply specifically to the USA, the reverse being true in other countries. For example, lenders checking credit reports for pre-approved credit cards. I'm not sure exactly how this works in the USA, but in the UK this would not happen.

This article could be moved to Credit history (US), or it could be expanded to include other countries. I favour the latter, but I'm getting tired of exapnding articles written by Americans, and clearly only for Americans. In the mean time I'll flag the article as needing a global view. Arcturus 22:01, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

Fully agreed. This article as it stands does little but duplicate information from Credit score (United States), which is a much more informative and better-written article. This article should be moved to Credit history (United States) and new articles should be written describing the generic concept of a credit history and credit score as they exist worldwide. AKADriver 19:50, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

OK, I've made this article specific to the US and moved it. I'll have a look at how we might develop a generic article(s) about the whole subject of credit and credit reference agencies. Arcturus 09:51, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

Having a different article for differnt countries is a poor solution, I seperated out the USA stuff (and improved the language) and moved it back. Martin 10:04, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

But you haven't separated out the USA stuff because the whole article relates to USA stuff, as noted in the earlier discussion. Perhaps you should have engaged in the discussion prior to the page move I made, and your undiscussed reversion. Arcturus 10:14, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

I started this article, I am British, you can understand how I thought it a bit odd when it was moved to Credit history (United States). Anyway, it would be a much better situation to simply move the USA stuff to Credit score (United States) or remove it altogether. The rest of the article, although not necessarily applicable to every country in the world, is not written from a USA POV. Martin 10:30, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

Interesting! I've just looked at your original article and I have to say it reads a great deal better than the current version. Your original is non-country specific. Unfortunately the article has been hijacked, and although it is not "USA POV" it certainly takes a USA perspective as, unfortunately, do many articles in Wikipedia. OK, so we leave it, but I think a bit more needs doing to separate out the USA stuff. Arcturus 10:39, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

Ok, thanks, I have removed the USA stuff, added a pointer to the USA article, and tried to globalise a bit, still needs some work though. Martin 10:46, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

Seems like a good compromise. I'll do a bit of work on it in due course. Regarding this statement A credit bureau may sell your contact information to an advertiser purchasing a list of people with similar characteristics, like homeowners with excellent credit. I'm sure this doesn't happen in the UK, but I might be wrong. Do you know? Thanks. Arcturus 10:53, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

I am not sure, but I really wouldn't be surprised if it was true. Martin 11:16, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] canada to usa

does anyone know if bad credit in canada can affect your credit history/score in the states? or vice versa. are the two connected? is there a law that states specifically the two cant be mixed together?

Nope. The two are totally separate. Yes, Equifax and TransUnion are on both sides of the border, but they don't share their records. Not sure about bankruptcy laws, but you could probably game the system and, say, use loans from one country to pay off the other, giving yourself great credit in the USA and terrible credit in Canada.

[edit] Domestic Issues

I have removed the "Domestic Issues" section because it was not encyclopedic. If someone cares to take a stab at rewriting it with a little fact behind the opinion, I'm open to suggestion. The addition seemed to be a bit more like an editorial column than an encyclopedic addition. //BankingBum 21:25, 27 February 2007 (UTC) ^$$

Yes anything you do such as use a credit card will be recorded by the credit bureaus and will have an effect on your USA credit report.

[edit] Multiple credit cards

The article currently states that having a large number of credit cards has no direct effect on a credit rating, but the U.S. Federal Trade Comission (http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/edu/pubs/consumer/credit/cre24.shtm) disagrees. Can this be cleared up? 71.110.192.61 23:35, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] annualcreditreport url

This URL seems legitimate but I don't know much about it, can someone weigh in on whether it is legitimately the sole official site for obtaining the federally mandated once-per-year free self-check? -- Thoreaulylazy (talk) 04:40, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

I think this page needs to be locked for unregistered/newly registered users. It looks like nobody is keeping an eye on it and spammers are getting away with advertising without proper sources to back up their claims. 75.13.165.19 (talk) 20:49, 1 March 2008 (UTC)