There are a lot of myths about the credit score. Many people tend to think that some credit activities can lower their credit score. Here are a few facts about your credit score. Checking your credit report does not deteriorate your credit score: Checking your own credit report goes down in the credit report as a soft inquiry and hence does not affect your credit score. However if a lender or a credit card company checks your credit report, it goes down as a hard inquiry and may cost you five points. But another important fact to be kept in mind is that all the inquiries in a 14-day period are considered as a single inquiry. The credit score rating system also does not take into consideration all the inquiries made within a period of 30 days before the day the credit score is to be computed. Closing old accounts does not improve your credit score: Many lenders might tell you to close old accounts that are not in use. But doing this simply robs you of a long credit history and more percentage of your total credit limit is used up if you close your account. Your FICO score is all you need: All the three major credit bureaus give you a FICO credit score rating formula. So your FICO score says all about your credit score and you don't need to bother to look for something else to calculate your credit score. Using the FICO Credit Score Rating System, the credit bureaus give you a credit score. However the names for these credit scores are different at these bureaus. At Equifax, they call it Beacon credit score. At TransUnion, they call it Empirica. At Experian, it is called Experian/Fair, Isaac Risk Model. The reason that you get different credit scores from all the bureaus is that reports of some credit activities performed by you is sent to one bureau and some to other. But more or less your credit score is the same. Credit counseling does not hurt your score: The FICO credit score rating system does not take into consideration any reference to credit counseling in your report. In fact if you are facing troubles managing your finances then you can try credit counseling. It does not go down as a negative in a credit report. The perfect way to improve your credit score is of course the simplest of them all pay your bills on time. Rid yourself of credit score myths and start your credit improvement stint as soon as possible.
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