myFICO Review – Free Credit Score Reporting

Hey everyone, thanks for joining me for this week’s review. Over the last while, more and more personal finance bloggers and experts have been stressing the importance of FICO scores. The bottom line is, your FICO score is most likely the most important 3 digit number you’ll ever come across. Knowing it’s importance, more and more consumers are becoming interested in credit monitoring. Today, we’re going to take a look at myFICO to see if they are a good option for doing just that.

Click to Get Your myFICO Credit Score.

myFICO Short Review

myFICO Pros – First off, the simplicity of the platform is great. It’s very easy to find what you’re looking for when you need it. I also really like the FICO score alerts. When you subscribe to myFICO’s services, you will get an advice when your score reaches brackets at the higher and lower marks. They also provide interest rate alerts to warn you if you’re spending more than you need. Finally, their pricing is pretty competitive and they’ve got great promotions.

myFICO Cons – When doing these reviews, I dig pretty deep for pros and cons. In this case, I was only able to find 2 drawbacks. First off, if you don’t cancel within the trial period, you will be committing to a minimum of 3 months service. So, it’s important not to forget if you’re not interested. Also, only 2 annual Experian reports are included. If you want reports from others, or more than 2 from Experian, you’ll need to pay for them.

myFICO Overall – Overall, myFICO offers really great products and services. They offer tons of tools for tracking your FICO score as well as things that will help you manage your personal financial portfolio. They offer all of this at a very competitive rate of $14.95 per month. However, there are some drawbacks. If you’re looking to actively pull reports more than 2 times per month from more than 1 provider, this may not be the option for you. Also, if you sign up for the free trial for the free service, but don’t want to continue, you’re going to need to make sure you cancel on time. If not, you’re on the hook for 3 months!

myFICO Long Review

OK, now it’s time to get into the nitty gritty. Thanks for staying tuned for the longer review. As always, I’m going to start with price. myFICO occasionally runs free trials. When they aren’t running a free trial, they generally run a $4.95 trial for 30 days. So if you want to try it out, you’re not going to pay much to do so. Once the trial is over, you’ll pay $14.95 per month. Finally on the pricing side, if you’d like a copy of your TransUnion report, you’ll find yourself paying $19.95 for it. Overall, the pricing is incredibly competitive as long as you’re not looking for a reporting from TransUnion every month or two.

Now, let’s dig into what you get for the price. One of my favorite aspects of this service is the alerts that they provide. As a member of myFICO, you’ll receive the following alerts…

• FICO Score – First off, you’ll get notified of what’s going on with your FICO score. If it moves up or down to a specific, preset mark, you’ll be notified.
• Interest Rates – When it comes to loans, you pay interest. There’s no mystery there. However, making sure the interest that you pay is competitive should be important to you. These alerts let you know if your rate goes up or down, and how competitive it is.
• Credit Alerts – Finally, myFICO offers a series of credit alerts. So many in fact that I’ll need to give you a list of the different types of credit alerts that you receive to really get the point across. Here’s the list.
• New Credit – If a new account is opened in your name, you’ll be notified.
• Account Changes – This applies to any change on your account that may have an affect on your credit score. For instance, if your available credit is increased or decreased, your score may be affected and you will receive an alert.
• Account Balance Increases – If your balance goes up to predetermined thresholds, they’ll let you know.
• Credit Inquiries – Any time there is an inquiry into your credit history or score, you’ll be notified.
• Newly Active Accounts – If you haven’t used credit cards in a while and it all of the sudden is used, you’ll be notified.
• Public Records – Bankruptcies, liens, and more are all public record. If something like this pops up on your public record, you’ll be notified.
• Collections – Having an account sent to collections could be detrimental to your credit score. Therefore, if this happens, they will send you an alert.
• Name Changes – If a name other than yours shows up on your credit report, they will notify you. This could be the result of a name change after marriage or divorce. However, it is also a great way to spot identity theft and fraud.
• Address & Phone Number – Finally, if your address and phone number are different on an account within your credit report, they’ll let you know. Although, you’ll know if you’ve changed your address or phone number, these alerts are important in the fight against identity theft.

So, What Are The Drawbacks

There are only 2 major drawbacks to this service. Here they are.

• Reports Included – The service only includes 2 Experian credit reports annually. If you’re looking to check your credit report more than twice a year, or you want to see what TransUnion says about you, you’ll have to pay extra fees. Although this isn’t a huge drawback, if you’re actively doing everything you can to improve your credit scoring, you’ll most likely want your report more often and from more sources.
• The 3 Month Kicker – If you forget to cancel after the free trial, you’ll be committing to trying the service for 3 months, and paying for it. I’m never a big fan of commitments being attached to promotions like this.

My Overall Thoughts Of myFICO

myFico is a great service. However, as with any other service, they’re not for everyone. In this case, it seems like the service was designed for those with Good to Excellent credit scores who are interested in keeping tabs on and protecting their credit report. However, if you’re looking for a way to track growth in a credit building process, this may not be your best bet. Because you can only pull 2 experian reports per year, you may need more in the process of building bad scores to good. However, if you’re part of their target market, those with good to excellent scores that just want to keep track, this is a great option for you! If still in doubt if myFico is really the one for you, don’t forget to check out other business companies that offer the same services. Compare their products to see which one best suits you and your needs.

Click to Get Your myFICO Credit Score.

Rating: 4.6 / 5