Federal law gives you free credit reports, free investigations of errors, free credit freezes, and a way to stop preapproved credit offers. Don’t save them for the day you apply. Once a year, pull your reports from all three credit bureaus, dispute anything wrong, freeze your credit, and opt out of those offers.
A lender reads your credit report when you apply, and a dispute can take a month to resolve. Any mistake you find then is already part of the decision.
The Fair Credit Reporting Act lets you use these rights on your own schedule, and four of them fit a routine you can run once a year. Pick a date you’ll remember, such as your birthday.
- Pull your reports from Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion at AnnualCreditReport.com, where each is free every week. Read all three, since not every lender reports your accounts to every bureau.
- Dispute anything wrong with each bureau that lists it, at no cost. Also dispute any late payment or other negative mark older than the law allows, which is seven years for most and 10 for a Chapter 7 bankruptcy.
- Freeze your credit at all three bureaus so no one can open new credit in your name, and lift the freeze only when you apply for something. Both are free.
- Opt out at OptOutPrescreen.com or 1-888-5-OPT-OUT (1-888-567-8688) to stop prescreened offers, the preapproved credit and insurance mail based on your credit report. That opt-out lasts five years, and signing and mailing the site’s form makes it permanent.
Two more rights are for when something goes wrong. If a lender, insurer, or employer turns you down because of your report, it must name the bureau that supplied the report, and you have 60 days to ask that bureau for a free copy. A free fraud alert, placed with any one bureau, tells lenders to confirm it’s you before opening an account in your name.
If a bureau or lender ignores any of these rights, file a complaint with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau at consumerfinance.gov/complaint.
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