Have I Got A Good Credit Score?

Good Credit can be defined in two ways:

1) Lenders and or Suppliers offer you good credit terms. In this instance, we mean that you are provided with a greater length of time to pay for goods or services than is offered to other people / businesses when they receive a loan, or purchase something from the same supplier.

Not only does good credit in this sense mean that you are offered longer payment terms, but you are also granted a greater amount of credit / the value that you are allowed to take from the creditor is greater than that which is offered to other people / businesses when they receive a loan, or purchase something from the same supplier.

2) You or your business has a good credit score. A credit score is made up of your payment histories to other creditors, whether you have any defaults, have any CCJ's, the amount of credit already given to you, credit references provided about you by your creditors, your age, location, your earnings and profession. There are a variety of ways that businesses will put together your credit score to assess whether you have good credit.

As a general rule, if you pay creditors promptly then you will have good credit. The more positive factors you have affecting your credit score (from the list above), then the better your credit score will be – e.g. higher income = better credit.

However, in today's society, relying on these points just isn't enough. Unfortunately, we have now entered what is widely known as the ‘information era', meaning that information is now a tradable commodity. This isn't a problem in most sectors – after all, we'd all happily pay for good information that could make us some money right? Well, this is exactly what is happening on a more and more frequent basis with credit information. People's credit records are readily being bought and sold by individuals (committing ID fraud) so that fraudsters can get credit (loans, purchases etc.) by using your good credit as collateral.

Therefore, we recommend that if you believe that you have good credit, it is even more worthwhile for you to check your credit file, as fraudsters can gain a greater level of credit by stealing your identity. To give an idea of the scale of the problem, the government estimates that ID fraud is currently costing the economy £1.72 billion a year.

Access your FREE CREDIT REPORT, from the main credit reference agencies here:

Get Your CreditExpert Credit Score From Experian CLICK HERE

Get Your Equifax Credit Score CLICK HERE

Get the 3 in 1 Credit Report from Checkmyfile (Based on Callcredit, Experian & Equifax data) CLICK HERE