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I recently wrote about an opportunity for most AAA customers to get free Experian credit monitoring. Now, it turns out that you don’t even need AAA. You just need a smart phone or tablet…
Experian has released a free iPhone and Android (in beta) app. The app provides credit monitoring and your Experian credit report, for free. The hook is that the app tries to upsell your FICO credit score from Experian (which you can get for free from Discover), and credit reports from TransUnion and Equifax (which you can get for free from Credit Karma). Here are the links to the app:
The app shows a credit overview and credit report details, including credit inquiries. And, it offers free credit monitoring, including alerting you to new hard inquiries.
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A positive trend
You’re probably aware that many credit card companies have begun to provide credit scores to their members for free. And, recently, Discover has begun offering free FICO credit scores from Experian for customers and non-customers alike. Now, we are beginning to see options for free credit reports (beyond once per year) and free credit monitoring as well.
A big thanks to Will DeWitt with Front Range Travel Hackers for letting me know about the Experian App!
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Just checked the FICO Score from my Discover account. Under it says
“Your FICO® Credit Score is based on your TransUnion credit report using the FICO® Score 8.”
At the same time, the FICO Score from my American Express account says “Your FICO® Score 8 based on Experian data is the same score used by American Express.”
[…] had signed up for the free Experian phone app on Monday after applying for the above cards (see: “Free Experian credit monitoring for iPhone and Android users”). I figured that the app’s credit monitoring feature had belatedly discovered the hard […]
[…] offers free FICO credit scores via their phone app and via their freecreditscore.com […]
[…] Frequent Miler has already covered this app, but basically it provides you with the same credit monitoring as above but tries to upsell you the FICO score. […]
[…] now, via FrequentMiler, Experian released a credit monitoring app for iPhone and Android that gives you your Experian […]
[…] Free Experian credit monitoring for iPhone and Android users by Frequent Miler. Too little too late from a business perspective by Experian. Pretty sure they just purchased freecreditscore.com recently as well and that also provides a free score. […]
So the credit report would be updated every 30 days?
Yes, but the credit monitoring part of the app shows inquiries as they happen. No need to wait for a full refresh.
I had signed up for “Free Experian Membership” on the website that gives me a free credit report every 30 days. The iPhone app for this is also the same as what you have mentioned. But credit monitoring alerts requires upgrading my account to “Experian CreditWorks”, which is not free. I am not sure if alerts are added on only when you sign up through the app. Any data points on this?
Previous sign-ups did not have credit monitoring. I called toll-free support and got my membership deactivated. I then logged back in and reactivated my free membership and I now have credit monitoring enabled for free.
I signed up. Wonder how often I can request them.
You don’t even need an app for the reports. They have it on a site too. Freecreditreport.com and freecreditscore.com are now owned by Experian and give you free access to your report and score respectively, though not FICO.
open https://www.freecreditscore.com/ in an incognito window, you get FICO and your credit report for free from experian. Opening the url in my normal window only offers the VANTAGE score for free.
Awesome tip, thanks!
I wouldn’t use the mobile platform for credit reports, especially given this option.