Wherever there are people experiencing trouble in their lives you will also find unscrupuless scamsters trying to take advantage of these unfortunate people when they are down. The average hard working person who finds that the have a low credit score is looking for quality information to assist them repair their creditworthiness but instead all they come across are people that are trying to rip them off. There are two very basic rules that apply here and everybody falls into one or the other category.

Rule 1: If your credit score is low and you have not defaulted on a loan then you can repair your credit score yourself and do not need the help of anyone.

Rule 2: If your credit score is low and you have defaults then you need the help of a professional debt counceling service and do not need the help of some nameless person asking you to pay money upfront for them to fix your credit score.

In the United States you can get a free credit report every 12 months from each of the three credit reporting agencies. The free report is available from only one web site annualcreditreport.com and you are entitled to get the report free according to the law. Beware of other sites offering free credit reports as you may be signing up for something that is going to cost you money. They may claim to be a free service but it converts to a payable membership service after a short period. If you have not canceled during the trial period you have unknowingly agreed for the company to charge your credit card with membership fees.

There are also imposter sites that will use “free credit report” in their names and when you do a search engine enquiry they come up in the list and invite you to click on them by having enticing and eye catching phrases that get you in. Other sites use common misspelling of words to get you to go to the wrong site for example ammualcreditreport.com instead of annualcreditreport.com and once you have made the mistake they will gather your information and direct you to another site where they will try to sell you a service to repair your credit score.

Your dealings with the three credit agencies and annualcreditreport.com are private and confidential. They do not send you emails asking for your personal information and they do not make phone calls to you trying to get you to use a service to fix your problem. If you get calls or emails after enquiring about your credit score then it is likely that you have been lured to a scam site and you should report it. Other things to look out for are pop-up ads that seem to come from nowhere and prove difficult to close. Any behavior of this type must be reported to the FTC (Federal Trade Commission) at spam@uce.gov.

Remember the rules: minor things you can repair yourself and major things and you should see a councelor to get the best advice possible.