Credit Report Monitoring Buyers Guide

Keeping an eye on your credit should be as important as locking your car doors at night. At any time someone can easily hack into your computer or rummage through your mail and get the information they need to cause major and expensive damage on your credit report.

Credit is a something that we work hard to maintain and in most cases we do our best to manage our spending. When you have an outside entity trying to gain access to your personal information it can become a nightmare in seconds. With Credit Report Monitoring, we can have a reputable company keep an eye on our credit.

These companies for a small monthly fee will track any activity on your credit reports and some will search the Internet for anyone who has already gotten your information and is now trying to sell or trade for it. Monitoring companies such as FreeCreditReport.com, LifeLock and Equifax all offer solid, safe and effective services. We can’t stare at our credit reports all day; these companies have dedicated their time and energy to help keep your credit safe.

FreeCreditReport.com

FreeCreditReport.com is one of the most well known credit report companies out there. Their commercials have three guys in pirate costumes, medieval clothes and rising roller coasters complaining they should have kept up with their credit reports. As fun as these commercials are the company does offer a great service. By monitoring your credit score and your credit report you can see whether your credit is being tampered with. When you sign up with FreeCreditReport.com you start with a free trial membership with their Triple Advantage Credit Monitoring Service.

After the free trial ends, you will be charged $ 14.95 each month, the free trial lasts about a month. The credit monitoring will include the company checking and keeping track of your credit report to ensure that no one has been stealing or inquiring about your credit. If there is any unauthorized activity the company will notify you via email. All three credit reports Experian, Equifax and Trans Union are all covered in your monthly fee.

You should always know what your credit score is, whether you wish to maintain the good credit you have or improve on the not so good credit, with FreeCreditReport.com you can do just that. You can check your credit score every month with the $ 14.95 monitoring service. This way you can see if someone has tampered with your credit. By logging on to their website you can sign up to get your Free Credit Report and Score right away. It is never too late to start keeping track of your credit.

LifeLock

LifeLock will help you protect your identity as well as monitor your credit report. LifeLock will notify you via email or wireless communication if someone has made a threat against your credit or if someone has hacked into your personal information. The company will monitor websites that may be trying to sell or trade your personal information. LifeLock offers two plans the LifeLock and the LifeLock Command Center. With the LifeLock Plan, you will receive eRecon, which is a service that offers searches on the Internet for illegal selling or trading your personal information. If LifeLock happens to find your name on any of these websites then they will alert you and help you take the proper steps in resolving the issue.

You will also receive True Address; this service was created to help consumers be aware of anyone trying to establish a new address with your information. You will also receive a Free Credit Report. For protection, you will receive a LifeLock Identity Alert System; you will receive a Reduce Pre-Approved Credit Card Offers, which will help decrease the risk of someone stealing these cards through the mail. You will also receive 24 Hour Member Service. The LifeLock Plan costs $ 10 a month.

The LifeLock Command Center offers all of the services of the LifeLock but in addition they offer Personal Breach Detection Services, Payday Loan Alerts and Reports in case someone tries to take out a Payday loan in your name. You will receive Sex Offender Registry Alerts and Reports, Alias Record Alerts and Court Record Alerts and Reports and so much more. The LifeLock Command Center costs $ 15 per month.

Equifax Personal Solutions

The Equifax Personal Solutions Plan offers 3 in 1 Monitoring. With this service you will receive Credit Score Simulations, 3 in 1 Credit Report, One Million Dollar ID Theft Insurance and 24/7 Customer Care. Equifax Personal Solutions also offers ID Protection; this includes the prevention of Identity Theft with Automatic Fraud Alerts. You will receive detection of any potential fraud activity as well as fraud insurance.

Equifax offers a way to keep the risk of fraud down. The credit report monitoring services will include any changes that may result in anyone opening a new account in your name, any credit inquiries, name changes, bankruptcies and other public records. You will receive monitoring of anyone trying to make changes to any of your accounts and if someone makes any address changes to any of your accounts.

Equifax offers 5 different Services, the ID Patrol, the 3 in 1 Monitoring + 4 FICO Scores and the Debt Wise Plans costs $ 14.95 per month and the Credit Watch and the Score Watch costs $ 12.95 months. To get more information on each of these plans, log onto the Equifax website.

Hiring one of these companies to protect our credit and monitor our personal information is worth it since if someone is able to hack into our credit reports it is going to cost us much more than the $ 14.95 companies like Equifax charge. With Identity Theft on the rise, we have to be diligent in watching our credit reports. There may come a time when you want to make a big purchase such as a house or a car and when you do, you come to find that someone has wrecked your credit and you did not know about it.

These companies will email or notify you of any alerts or threats made against your credit. Even if someone makes a credit inquiry the monitoring companies will know about it. Do some comparisons with Equifax, FreeCreditReport.com and LikeLock and see which company can do the best job for you. It is very important that you order your credit report and score twice a year, so you can take a look for yourself and see if anything looks out of place.