Understanding Your Credit Score

Your Credit Rights

You are protected against unfair credit discrimination and are guaranteed equal access to credit privileges based solely on your credit history (or in some cases, that of a spouse or former spouse) and other financial information.

Credit cannot be denied based on your age (if you are at least 18 years of age), racial background, sex, marital status, religion, national origin, or the fact that your income is derived from a public assistance program. These rights are protected by the Equal Credit Opportunity Act.

Your Cardholder Agreement

The Truth-In-Lending Act requires disclosure of interest and fees that can be charged to you by a credit card issuer. Explanation of how and when charges will be applied to your account can be found in your cardholder agreement and on the back of your monthly statement.

Read these documents with care to fully understand how you are being charged and how your interest payments are being calculated. If you have any questions, contact your credit card issuer.

Billing errors can be corrected.

The Fair Credit Billing Act protects you in billing disputes with card issuers and certain other creditors. If you think you have found an error, write to the billing dispute address on your statement.

You must contact your card issuer within 60 days after they send you the first bill containing the error. You do not have to pay any amount in question during the investigation, but you are still obligated to pay any undisputed charges.

Your card issuer is legally obligated to acknowledge your letter within 30 days and must either correct the error or explain it to you in writing within two billing cycles.

Your Credit Report

The Fair Credit Reporting Act guarantees you access to the information in your credit history. You can order a copy of your report from the three national agencies for a small fee:

Equifax 1-800-685-1111
Experian 1-800-311-4769
Trans Union 1-800-888-4213

Your credit report must be correct.

You have the right to a free copy of your report if you were denied credit because of it within the last 60 days. You are also entitled to know the names of anyone else who received the report so that you may correct any errors.