If you’ve ever had a credit card, a utility account, or taken out a bank loan, each of the major financial reporting firms—Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion—probably has a credit profile on you. Typically, prospective creditors use not only your credit profiles, but also the credit score derived from them to make credit decisions. Even though your credit score may not be the sole basis for loan or credit decisions, it is a tool for determining whether you can get credit and how much you will pay for it.
Stateside, you can obtain a copy online or by phone. However, from overseas locations your only option will be to request your free report by mail.
By law, you are entitled to a free copy of your credit report from each of the three major reporting firms once every 12 months. The best way to monitor your credit status throughout the year is to request a new report from a different one of the three firms once every four months.
Your reports will be mailed to you within 15 days. Please, allow 2-3 weeks for delivery.
Just as you have three credit reports, you also have three separate credit scores. When the three reports are accurate and in agreement, your three scores will be very similar, since they are all arrived at using the same formula. (These scores are sometimes referred to as FICO scores, after the company that developed the formula, Fair Isaac Corporation.) You can obtain your credit score, for a nominal fee set by the Federal Trade Commission, directly from any one of the reporting companies.
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