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.

Free Canadian Credit Report

Understanding credit reports and scores

The Government of Canada offers a free publication called Understanding Your Credit Report and Credit Score. This publication provides sample credit report and credit score documents with explanations of the notations and codes that are used. It also contains general information on how to build or improve credit history, and how to check for signs that identity theft has occurred. The publication is available online at the website of the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada. Paper copies can also be ordered at no charge for residents of Canada.

The Financial Consumer Agency of Canada was founded in 2001 under the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada Act. It was established to consolidate and strengthen oversight of consumer protection measures in the federally regulated financial sector, and to expand consumer education. While some consumer protection activities existed previously, they were dispersed among various federal entities.

The Financial Consumer Agency of Canada's creation was one in a series of initiatives resulting from an extensive period of study and public consultation on financial sector reform.

Check your credit report

It's a good idea to request a copy of your credit report from the three credit-reporting agencies at least once a year to verify that your personal information is up to date, that your financial information is correct, and to ensure that you have not been the victim of identity fraud. Because your credit information can be kept by more than one credit-reporting agency, and because those agencies do not necessarily share information, it's important to check all three credit reports carefully.

Although there are many ways to order your credit report, such as by phone, fax or e-mail, the easiest and safest methods are by mail or by Internet.

By mail:

If you make your request in writing and send it by mail, the credit-reporting agencies will provide you, by mail, with a free copy of your report. It is important, however, that in your request you include a copy of two pieces of I.D. Contact the credit-reporting agencies to find out which pieces of I.D. are acceptable.

By Internet:

You can also order your credit report through the reporting agencies' websites. This method is faster since you will receive your credit report online only a few minutes after you made the request. However, credit-reporting agencies charge a fee for providing you with an online copy of your credit report.

How can you get errors on your credit report corrected

When you get your credit report, make sure the information in it is correct and up to date. If you believe that the information in your credit report is incorrect, follow these steps.

1. Contact the credit reporting agency

Before the credit reporting agency can make a correction on your credit report, it will have to contact the financial institution that reported the information to see if an error was made.

If the financial institution agrees that an error was made, the credit reporting agency has 30 days (with the exception of Alberta that allows 90 days) to correct your credit report. If the financial institution says that the information reported is correct but you are still not satisfied, you can submit a brief statement to the credit reporting agency, explaining your situation. This statement will be added to your credit report.

2. Contact your financial institution

To avoid any delays in getting errors on your credit report corrected, you can contact the financial institution that provided the incorrect information to the credit reporting agency and ask the financial institution to follow up with the credit reporting agency.

If the error came from your financial institution and the institution will not correct the error, ask for information on its complaint-handling process. Financial institutions that are regulated by the Government of Canada are required, by law, to have a process in place to resolve disputes between consumers and financial institutions.