Credit reports contain a full history of your debts and have become mandatory when you seek loans, credit cards or even when you want a job. Yes! This report has become one of the significant financial responsibilities.

What does a credit report consist of?

A credit report has detailed information about your credit history: loans and debts along with personal information. It is the basis of your credit score, which should ideally be good, denoting good financial management.

The credit report contains:

• Personal identity

Your full name, Social Security number, date of birth and employment information, address and license number is the information that is present on your credit report. This information is changed or updated with any alteration provided by the lender you must have approached.

• Collections and public record items

Apart from personal information, your credit check will also make you aware that it contains information about your debts and collections. Your credit related things will be available with public records and collection accounts as well. For instance, any bill you owed that went into collection for a year will be reflected in your credit report and will ruin your credit rating.

• History concerning credit

An annual credit report integrates one’s credit history and current obligations. The creditor should report current obligations to the reporting agencies to avoid discrepancies in the credit score. In this section of the report, you will find dates of opened accounts, types of accounts, account balances and credit limit, history about each account along with late payments, unpaid child support and overdrawn checking accounts.

• Credit inquiries

All inquiries from the last two years will be reflected in your credit report. It details your loan application date and whether you are granted the loan or not. All these inquiries will be there on your credit report.

Credit scores are based on the report, so you should maintain a reliable financial profile with good scores. Everyone in the US can have his or her annual credit report for free from the three reporting agencies including Equifax, Transunion and Experian.

To have your credit report free of any discrepancy, theft or bad rating, you should regularly keep an eye on your credit report. Check your credit report and credit score more often than once a year by enrolling with a credit monitoring service that will keep you up to date with your credit score changes.