Credit Monitoring Services

As identity theft and fraud incidents increase dramatically, the credit reporting industry has started providing early warning systems to people concerned about identity thefts.

Credit monitoring has been one of many services brought to market in recent years to fight the identity theft problem. Such services promise to detect identity theft by notifying consumers of changes in their credit reports.

What Credit Monitoring Services Can Do for You

Credit monitoring is a service you subscribe to, along with a fee. The credit monitoring services keep a close eye on your credit report, track changes, and provide regular reports. The e-mail alerts about changes in the credit report can help consumers spot potential fraud quickly enough to limit damage. For example, unauthorized accounts opened in your name or credit queries from unfamiliar sources could mean someone is fraudulently using your identity.

The actual services provided for the subscription price vary widely among different companies, ranging from around $50 to $150 per year and include monitoring a credit report daily and sending daily or weekly alerts via e-mail.

Here’s what you get for your fee:

An immediate copy of your current credit report
Regular monitoring of your credit report, checking for suspicious activity like new accounts, address changes, late payments, etc.
Online access to your credit report at any time of day
Weekly or monthly credit alerts via email, containing such information as credit inquiries, negative information, new accounts, public records, delinquencies, address changes, employment changes, etc.

Some credit monitoring companies even offer a credit analysis in their regular reports, and provide advice on how to improve a credit score.

High Costs of Restoring a Stolen Identity

The statistics for identity theft and fraud are getting worse. Identity theft cost American enterprises and victims nearly $52.6 billion in 2004. Identity theft victims have reported spending significant amounts of time trying to resolve the problems such as bounced checks, loan denials, credit card application rejections, and debt collection harassment.

Victims spend countless hours clearing their name and credit history. In a 2003 study for the Federal Trade Commission by the market research firm Synovate determined that victims had to spend 30 hours resolving the mess. In another study, victims spent an average of $1,500 and 175 hours, actively trying to resolve their identity theft-related problems in 2004.

With literally thousands of identity theft scams circulating everyday, there's no guarantee a careful consumer won't be a victim.

Should You Do It Yourself or Use a Credit Monitoring Service?

Consumer advocates state that these services can be costly and incomplete. On the contrary, providers say many are too busy to monitor their reports regularly although they can get credit reports themselves.

So should you do it yourself or subsribe to the service? This is not an easy question to answer. Credit monitoring requires regular and consistent credit checks. Some people have a natural inclination of keeping track of daily things to do, some simply forget. Some don't want to be bothered. The best analogy is that you can cut your own lawn, but you might be inclined to pay for the convenience of having someone do it for you. But the analogy stops there. If you forget to do it, the consequence of identity fraud may be devastating.

Considering high costs of restoring stolen identity, credit monitoring service may be worthwhile, especially if you fall into one of the following situations:.

you have experienced identity theft or fraud
your personal information has been compromised
you are trying to improve credit rating and need to monitor your credit score
your credit report includes inaccurate information and are in the process of dispute
you have been recently divoced and want to keep an eye on your credit report
you have cosigned a loan and want to make sure that the primary borrower is making payments on time
you make online transactions frequently
you make frequent international trips
you are too busy to check your own credit reports
you don't check your accounts often
you don't want forget to check your credit reports regularly
you don't want to be bothered to do it yourself on a regular basis

Credit Monitoring Services Available:

Citi ^SM Credit Monitoring
Identity protection with Citi^SM Credit Monitoring Service. Receive credit reports, tools to help manage your credit score, alerts against possible fraud.

Identity Guard Credit Monitoring
They offer a free copy of Equifax Consumer Credit Report when you sign up for their Credit Check Monitoring Service.

TrueCredit.com
Their credit monitoring service is one of the most comprehensive with easy-to-understand analysis and convenient tools. They also offer 3-in-1 credit report which includes all three credit reports from major credit bureaus: the most comprehensive picture of your credit history.