With the increase in identity theft (that Equifax breach scared everyone) I have been asked multiple times about what steps I’m taking to protect my credit.
Protecting your credit is not a one size fits all approach.
There are multiple ways to protect your credit and you should choose the option that is best for you.
Credit Monitoring
You can monitor your credit yourself by reviewing your credit report for changes, inconsistencies or suspicious activity.
You can do this on by requesting your credit report for one of the credit bureaus at www.annualcreditreport.com.
You are only allowed to receive one free credit report (per bureau) a year, so you can request a copy from one of the credit bureaus (Experian, Equifax or TransUnion) every 4 months.
In the other months, you can use Credit Sesame to help alert you of any changes to your credit report.
When you sign up for Credit Sesame they check monthly for any changes to your credit report and provides you with your TransUnion Vantage 3.0 credit score.
Another great advantage of using Credit Sesame is the free identity Theft Insurance that I talk about more below.
Identity Theft Insurance
Another way to protect your credit is by having identity theft insurance.
Identity theft insurance helps covers costs related to reclaiming your financial identity and repairing your credit report.
According to USA Today, identity theft insurance can cost anywhere from $5 to $30 a month.
As I stated earlier, Credit Sesame also provides identity theft Insurance for FREE. It covers up to $50,000 and they provide you with live support while you are working to restore your credit.
They also offer a premium service for $15.95 that includes a $1 million in identity theft insurance, daily credit score monitoring and updates from all 3 credit bureaus, and your full credit report from all three credit bureaus.
Set up a Fraud Alert
A fraud alert can be temporarily placed on your credit for 90 days and it alerts lenders that you are a potential victim of identity theft.
It’s free at all three agencies and you only have to request it at one agency and it would go into effect at all credit reporting agencies.
There is also an extended fraud alert available to identity theft victims.
The extended fraud alert requires an incident report from the police department and it lasts for 7 years.
Credit Freeze
A credit freeze prevents lenders from accessing your credit report, so they would not be able to extend credit.
In order for lenders to access your credit report, you will have to unfreeze your report, which requires a PIN.
You can unfreeze your credit report for a period of time, a specific company or a specific person. There is a fee for freezing and unfreezing your report and the fee varies depending on which state you live in.
Due to fees associated with freezing and unfreezing your report, this option should only be considered if you do not plan to use your credit for a while.
Hopefully, you have a better understanding of how to protect your credit.
If you are in the beginning stages of protecting your credit, Credit Sesame is a great place to start.
I use them myself to monitor my credit and was really impressed when I recently opened a new credit account and I received an email asking if I opened the account, as soon as it popped up on my credit report.
I also like the updated credit score I receive monthly, it's not my FICO score but it does give me a range and it's actually pretty close to my FICO score.
So if you're interested click here to sign up for free.
