Welcome to Credit Report resource site!

Credit report or credit history is a record of an individual's or company's past borrowing and repaying, including information about late payments and bankruptcy. This information is used by lenders such as credit card companies to determine an individual's or entity's means and willingness to repay an indebtedness.

Credit Reporting Agencies

In the United States, once every 12 months, each person is entitled to one free credit report from each of the three nationwide consumer credit reporting companies: Equifax, Experian and TransUnion.

All of the transactions you have that involve credit are reported monthly to credit reporting agencies by the merchants or creditors you deal with. Most large creditors report this information to all three national credit reporting agencies. Some smaller lenders or merchants, however, may only report the information to one. For this reason, your report from each credit reporting agency may not be the same. You might get a copy of your report from Experian that does not include an account that shows up on your report that is maintained by TransUnion. For this reason, it is wise to review copies of all three reports.

Credit report agencies (CRAs) have a number of responsibilities under FCRA, including the following:

• Provide a consumer with information about him or her in the agency's files and to take steps to verify the accuracy of information disputed by a consumer. Under the Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act (FACTA), an amendment to the FCRA passed in 2003, consumers are now able to receive one free credit report a year. The free report can be requested by telephone, mail or through the government authorized website, annualcreditreport.com.
• If negative information is removed as a result of a consumer's dispute, it may not be reinserted without notifying the consumer within 5 days, in writing.
• CRAs may not retain negative information for an excessive period of time. The FCRA spells out how long negative information, such as late payments, bankruptcies, tax liens or judgments may stay on a consumer's credit report - typically 7 years from the date of the delinquency. The exceptions: bankruptcies (10 years) and tax liens (7 years from the time they are paid).

Equifax: Equifax has been providing value-added information solutions to businesses and consumers for over 107 years. Today, Equifax is a global service provider with over $1.4 billion in annual revenue and 4,600 employees in 13 countries.

Experian: Experian is a global leader in providing value-added information solutions to organizations and consumers. Experian provides information, analytics, decision-making solutions and processing services. Using its comprehensive understanding of individuals, markets and economies, it helps organizations to find, develop and manage customer relationships to make their businesses more profitable. Experian promotes greater financial health and opportunity among consumers by enabling them to understand, manage and protect their personal information.

TransUnion:TransUnion is a global leader in credit and information management. For more than 30 years, TransUnion has worked with businesses and consumers to gather, analyze and deliver the critical information needed to build strong economies throughout the world. The result? Businesses can better manage risk and customer relationships. And consumers can better understand and manage credit so they can achieve their financial goals. TransUnion's dedicated associates support more than 50,000 customers on six continents and more than 500 million consumers worldwide.