I spoke to a customer service representative this morning RE: my Equifax Credit Watch account (800-701-0340) and I was told something by a kind young woman that will have ripples through your Equifax hard inquiry bumpage efforts. I was told that effective 11/11/2002 new customers will NO LONGER be able to have unlimited access to thier report and score. Those customers who sign-up before 11/11/2002 will have unlimited access to their credit report and score online for $69.95. It has not yet been determined how many 'pulls' the customer will have after that date, but the customer service representative said that before this product was offered, customers were only able to pull six credit reports and it is likely it would revert back to that product offering. For those of you who like bumpage, it sounds like this is going to have serious ramifications on your efforts. If your Credit Watch subscription is due to expire soon and you still like unlimited access to your report and score, I would recommend renewing your subscription before 11/11/2002...at least based on the information I received this morning. Once your service expires, you will no longer be able to have unlimited access to your report and score. At that point, the woman told me that Equifax was likely to offer "something special" to those who were customers before this change, but she couldn't or wouldn't say what. I thought many of you would be interested in this information. Hawg Hanner
HMMM, very interesting! Good thing mines good til Sept. By Next Sept I'm hoping that I don't still feel the need to check my reports daily. I'll have moved onto something else to obssess about by then, I'm sure! LOL
So Hawg, if I read your last statement right, even for those of us who use CreditWatch will be impacted by forcing change to "something special"? Or do you mean to say that we will still have the ability to use CreditWatch, we will just be limited to a weekly or monthly pull instead of daily? Since George hasn't chimed in yet... UNLIMITED MEANS UNLIMITED. If they chop my ability further to access my report, then I'll just have to get my money back. Let me see...$69/365=.19 cents per day. If they only allow us weekly pulls then they owe me $59 back, pro-rated of course for the last 3 months I've used it every day. As far as I'm concerned, they made a contract with me when I signed up for CreditWatch. If they break that contract by further limiting my access abilities, then I guess I'll have to sue for breach of contract. BTW, if anyone does sign up, you may want to screenprint each sign-up screen and conditions for this very purpose.
The way I understand it is if you signed up for Credit Watch, you signed up for a one year subscription. You won't have to change to "something special" at all, if you have a subscription now. However, if you subscription runs out AFTER 11/11/2002, you will NOT be able to sign-up again for unlimited access to your credit report/score. If you want Credit Watch at all after your subscription ends, you'll have to sign-up for their watered down version. Hawg Hanner
Thanks Hawg. So we're safe for now. Except for bumpage??? How do they intend to manage that for us???
I don't think bumpage is affected at all, as long as you can continue to make inquiries via Credit Watch. I think the only reason they are changing this all-you-can-eat deal is because a lot of people (ahem, CREDITNET.com'ers) are using Credit Watch in excess or beyond what they expected and it is taxing their system. As such, their anticipated margins have gone down and thus need to evaluate how much they charge and/or offer to the consumer. Hawg Hanner
I have no doubt that you were told this, but to be completely honest, I don't believe a bit of it. Remember when bumpage was going to put out to pasture in Sept.? What happened to that?
Call them yourself. I actually called back again to try to get details on what the new deal will be after 11/11/2002 and got a different person altogether. I asked him about this change to the product offering and he quoted the information back to me verbatim. Hawg Hanner
LKH, EQ has definitely told some interesting tales over the past few months haven't they? I'm with you. I'll believe their changes when they make them. But even then...they'll probably change again in a few weeks. DemPooches
Right on George. If EQ had half a brain, they'd realize consumer's are on to the fact that inquiries lower their FICO scores, so they are more careful about shopping insurance, shopping mortgages, applying for credit. Every time a consumer chooses NOT to do one of these things, it costs EQ money because fewer credit reports are pulled.
EVERYBODY WILL NOT PAY FOR CW...we will have to just get a FREE credit report when DENIED or APPROVED...EQUIFAX WILL MAKE "TONS" OF MONEY THAT WAY!!!
If the price of "LIMITED" pulls is $69.95~~~THAT'S A RIP-OFF~~~IF IT IS LIKE $12.00 ($2.00 each), that's OK, I GUESS.
Help!! I have been unable to order credit watch for about 6 months...they are "sending it to the tech dept" (uh huh) I want to try the bumpage thing (Does it take 3 months of daily pulling to see some results?) but since I can't use CW, does anyone else offer that type of service? Thanks!
Hawg Hanner, I did. Just wanted to confirm nothing had happened BEFORE 11/11 by way of statements on their web site. Who knows if this is reliable intel, but I appreciate it nonetheless...I nudged a friend into signing up today.
Uh, I think that's really wrong, George. Given that Creditnet has only a few hundred active members (despite the 5000 who have registered, most of whom have registered and simply disappeared thereafter), I seriously doubt that we Creditnetters make up a truly significant portion of Equifax's income. "Bumpage" is something that's popular among a handful of Creditnet fans, but it's not something that's known across the internet. Despite that, Equifax has affiliate links on tens of thousands of internet sites. They could care less about our little group, so your position that they won't make any money without bumpage is a bit self-centered (or Creditnet-centered, anyway), don't you think? Doc
$69.95/365=$0.19 PER DAY $69.95/6=$11.66 PER DAY PRETTY EXPENSIVE!!! You mean we are NOT that important??? Oh well... Why did EXPERIAN "jump" @ INQUIRY KILLER???
