There’s been talk recently about a new credit score company, called Free Score. You might recognize their name because most of their commercials have Ben Stein in them, gotta love the guy! Anyways, Free Score is a company that provides “free” credit scores through the three big chain reporting agencies: Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion.
Looks like the navigation around their site is simple and straight forward. With big buttons, it’s obvious where you should navigate. A cool thing they do is provide you with a sample report before you commit to using their service.
Since I check my credit score on a regular basis, I didn’t find a use for registering through Free Score. In fact, I don’t believe Free Score is free at all. The free credit score they offer comes with some weight attached. That is one of the drawbacks of using them. I found some fine print that you should know about. Here’s the first piece you need to know about:
“FreeScore.com is not affiliated with the annual free credit report program. Under a new Federal law, you have the right to receive a copy of your credit report once every 12 months from each of the three nationwide consumer reporting companies. To request your free annual report under law, you must go to www.annualcreditreport.com.”
This basically means that since Free Score is not allifiated with Annual Credit Report, you have to pay to use their service. This is why their name is kind of tricky. At least they tell you about on their website and how to get your free credit score. There is more fineprint about how Free Score works in terms of payment and use:
“FreeScore provides you with the tools you need to access and monitor your financial/credit information through the program’s credit reporting and monitoring benefits. FreeScore and its benefit providers are not credit repair service providers and do not receive fees for such services, nor are they credit clinics, credit repair or credit services organizations or businesses, as defined by federal and state law. Credit information provided by TransUnion Interactive, Inc.”
In other words, Free Score is run by TransUnion. Basically, what Free Score does is provide credit monitoring for a monthly fee. Another important thing to point out is that Free Score doesn’t provide services if your credit score does get hacked or ruined by identity theft. It’s simply a monitoring tool.
So, if one did want to see their credit score through Free Score, you actually have to hunt down the pricing on the official registration page. You can check out the pricing and details on the right side of the registration page in small font. Here is what it says:
“Simply click “View Scores” on the next page to activate your FreeScoretrial membership and claim your 3-in-1 Credit Profile and Triple Credit Score. After your 7-day FREE trial period it’s just $19.95 per month forFreeScore. Remember, you can call FreeScore toll-free at 1-800-316-8824 within the first 7 days to cancel, and you will not be charged/debited.”
What this tells us is that it’s a membership signup, not a one time deal. By signing up with Free Score, you are automatically enrolled in a 7 day trial where you can check out your credit score at any time. Once the trial is up, you are automatically enrolled in their monthly membership package of $19.95/month. So, if you do use Free Score, you will want to make sure you cancel within the 7 day trial period to ensure that you don’t get billed for something you don’t want.
Free score is similar to Free Credit Report, in that they both offer something for free, but in reality, both are membership sites that cost money on a monthly basis. It’s kind of shady how they market their site and services, so it’s up to you whether or not to take the plunge.
So, should you use Free Score? Like everything in life, it’s up to you. If you want to get a free score, sure go for it. But if you don’t want to incur a monthly fee for monitoring services, then no, it’s not for you and you should look elsewhere. Whether you use Free Score or not, you should always read the fine print, I just did the work for you on this company 😉
To the readers, has anyone used Free Score recently? What are thoughts on their credit monitoring services?
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