If you have any doubt about your consumer rights according to the Fair and Accurate Credit Transaction Act of 2003 (FACTA), take a look at this documentation. Your rights and responsibilities are spelled out here. A great place to find this documentation is at the Federal Trade Commission website.

Evaluation Tips

If you are seeking monitoring services for which you may have to pay here is a short guideline to help you along the way. Please view these tips:

• Choose a website that has a clear cancellation policy. Also, before you sign up make sure you read all the terms and services as specified.
• If you can, make sure you are receiving monitoring services you cannot otherwise get for free. It would take a careful study of federal guidelines to be sure, but you can use your best judgment. If you are not sure what your rights are you can take a look at the Fair Credit Report Act documentation.
• Make sure you know whether or not you are going to receive the credit score given out by FICO or whether or it is from some other obscure organization. The FICO one is most reliable.
• Find out who owns the companies who charge for credit reports. This should give you some idea as to whether or not the services are necessary-so necessary you would be willing to invest money.
• Make sure the site you use is secure. One way to know is if you see signs that it is verified. You can also read its privacy or security policy.

1. Register free with a qualified participant

2. Request daily alerts

3.Request from all three major credit bureaus (Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion)

How to Sign Up

Usually all you need to do is fill out your name, address, and other personal information. WARNING: If you are seeking an online instant credit report for the first time make sure you trust the source!

NEVER give your information to an online credit report checker you cannot verify. If you send your informantion to a fraudulent site, you could have your identity stolen.

Why you should Sign Up

The reason you may want to get a report of your financial history is that perhaps you need to know your credit score. This is handy to have if you plan to walk into a place sometime in the near future looking for a car or home loan.

You also are encouraged to sign up in the event someone has used your informant against your will. Monitoring your payment histories on a regular basis can stop you from having someone ruin your credit.

Furthermore, if anyone has stolen your identity the problem can be taken care of faster than if the situation is not caught right away. If you are not received alerts, you should begin to seek them today.

These are the two main reasons you can sign up. Furthermore, you can also track your progress as far as paying off debts you owe.

Benefits

When you seek the right information about your financial history, it can alert you of one or more of the following things:

1. Who is seeking reports on you (i.e. credit card companies, phone companies)

2. Learn how creditworthy you really are-or how you need to improve it
View a record of your payment histories

3. See how you compare to other consumers

Precautions

Of course, you need to remember also that many credit report checks are free that often you are just signing up for a trial period. This is important to remember in case you wonder why you are later being charged for the service. If you sign up to keep track of your financial history and payment records make sure you realize the terms of agreement.