Credit bureau move creates 'secret' scores

This is real nice. It is tough enough to keep track of your credit worthiness, now we can't even get the real FICO score. By the way you can get a free copy of your credit report each year from the three major credit bureaus (this will not include your FICO score, you will have to pay a small fee for that) Here is a tip: Request your credit report from a different credit agency every four months, you will still be only getting one from each agency a year but can keep current on your credit every four months.-Lou

Experian Tel: 888-397-3742

Equifax Tel: 800-685-1111

Transunion Tel: 800-888-4213

Here is a good link on credit matters. http://www.bcsalliance.com/credit_test.html

Credit bureau move creates 'secret' scores

Credit bureau Experian's recent move means lenders can see FICO scores that you can't. That's just wrong, and the law needs to catch up with today's credit scoring practices.

By Liz Pulliam Weston
MSN Money

Experian wants to keep you in the dark.

There's really no other way to characterize the credit bureau's decision to stop selling FICO credit scores to individuals as of Feb. 14. Experian pulled out of its agreement with myFICO.com, which had been the only place where consumers could buy their FICO scores from all three bureaus.

Experian will continue to sell FICOs to lenders. That's big business, because the FICO is the leading credit scoring formula and the one used by most lenders.

But to consumers, Experian is pretending the FICO is no big deal.
"There is no one credit score that all financial institutions use to make decisions, and there is also no one credit score that consumers must use to help them understand and manage their credit," Experian spokeswoman Susan Hensen wrote me in an e-mail. "There are many reputable credit scores on the market that consumers can use to evaluate their creditworthiness before making financial decisions."

Experian has been reciting this line for years. When consumers buy credit scores directly from Experian, they're sold what the bureau calls "educational" scores, Experian's PLUS or the VantageScore, a formula cooked up with the other two major bureaus that's gone over like a lead balloon with lenders.

So many consumers have been fooled by this gambit, thinking they're getting FICOs when they're not, that some consumer advocates refer to these other credit scores as "FAKO scores."

Read Article Here:

http://articles.moneycentral.msn.com/SavingandDebt/ConsumerActionGuide/tell-congress-no-more-secret-scores.aspx