The Wall Street Journal had a story on Thursday, Oct 27th about the 3 credit bureaus latest income initiatives they are working on to boost their profits. They are using all of the information that they have on us to be able to predict our future spending patterns. They are compiling their data on our ages, gender, time in residence, auto ownership, time on jobs and maritial status. With all of this information including our debt and repayment history, it is not hard to see how this information can be used to predict our future spending with a new "ability to pay" index.
This data will be sold to companies to help them plan their marketing efforts in targeting us with higher precision for smarter advertising.
These bureaus are getting more and more powerful and these new iniatives are not regulated by current consumer laws. I wish these bureaus would spend more of their money, time and energy into cleaning up incorrect reporting and in making it easier for people to fix problems of inaccurate information on their credit reports.
Maintaining a good credit score is much more important now and will be even more important in the years to come with these kinds of initiatives. For example, the article said that 60% of employers are now checking the credit scores on future employees. The thinking is that your score determines your character and your sense of responsibility. This can wrongfully hurt those that had ID theft or erroreous things put on them.
Have you checked your credit lately? You get one free check per bureau every year by going to www.annualcreditreport.com. Since most information is reported to all three, you can check one bureau every 4 months so you can stay on top of the things being reported on you.
Posted by Sam Thompson
Senior Loan Officer
Southern Trust Mortgage - 910-852-9415
Helping you GROW your business!
www.activerain.com./luckydog1 - SC
www.activerain.com/luckydog2 - NC
http://www.southerntrust.com/thompson
http://www.southernpineshomemortgage.com
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