A credit report is a file that includes your personal information, including how you pay your bills, how much and what type of debt you have, how many credit cards and loans you have open. The American Fair Credit Reporting Act is the law that regulates credit reporting agencies.
It also tells potential creditors if they should lend to you or not based on the information it has collected about you. For example, if you are late on payments for services including utilities and credit card bills, this may indicate that your budgeting skills need improvement.
To see your report, you have to order it. You can order your credit report from any of the three major credit report bureaus: Experian, TransUnion and Equifax. The reports from each agency will be different because they will reflect different creditors’ accounts, pay history and outstanding debt.
Go Online To Order Your Credit Report If you have a computer with Internet access, you can go directly to the website of one of the three credit reporting agencies without having to pay for a full copy of your report in advance.
Creditors and other companies that check credit will use the information in your report to determine if they want to extend their services, sell you goods or provide you with a job. Your report will also reflect whether or not you pay bills on time and how high your outstanding debts are. If you have high outstanding debt and are in the process of paying it off, your creditors will be able to see that you were having problems making payments and how much time it took to pay off your debt.
The credit report content is primarily based on your payment history. If you repay your debts in full and on time, the credit bureaus will report this to the other agencies, who then include this information in their reports. If you have paid one bill but not another, or if you have missed or been late making payments on some bills but not others, this may also show up on your report.
