There are different types of inquires. It depends of the type of inquiry that was made. Only the inquiries that you yourself authorize, can legally be put on your report that can affect your score. For example, you apply for a credit card, or give the car salesperson your name and ssn because your looking for a car. And each one lowers your score by 8-15 points. There are types of inquires that do not affect your score. If you did not authorize one or more of the inquires on you report, the law requires that it be removed at your request
This is a excerpt from an equifax report about inquires that don’t affect your score. The credit card inqs are probably of the first type unless you sent in a bunch of applications previousily
"THE FOLLOWING INQUIRIES ARE NOT REPORTED TO BUSINESSES:
PRM - This type of inquiry means that only your name and address were given to a credit grantor so they
could offer you an application for credit. (PRM inquiries remain on file for 12 months.)
AM or AR - These inquiries indicate a periodic review of your credit history by one of your creditors (AM and
AR inquiries remain on file for 12 months.)
EQUIFAX, ACIS or UPDATE - These inquiries indicate Equifax’s activity in response to your contact with us
for either a copy of your credit file or a request for research.
PRM, AM, AR, INQ, EQUIFAX, ACIS and UPDATE inquiries do not show on credit files that businesses
receive, only on copies provided to you.
I recently ordered my credit profile from all three agencies, but none of the reports mention anything about a credit “score”. Where would I look to obtain a numerical value?
When I was unemployed and broke (now I am employed and still broke), I walked into a JC Penny store and filled out a crredit application. I knew I’d be rejected. BUt I also knew I could ask to see my credit report free due to the rejection.
Just for filling out the application, JC Penny gave me a $5 gift certificate for anything in the store.
I didn’t need anything, except a ride home. And you couldn’t buy anything in there for $5 anyway.
On my way out, I picked up a JC Penny catalog. Price? $4.00
The clerk blinked at the voucher, blinked at the catalog, looked at me and said: “Well, it doesn’t say you can’t use this gift certificate to buy a catalog”.
I got the catalog (nice pillow during my bus ride home) AND a dollar change!
The catalog contained yet another $5 gift certificate! I didn’t have the guts to try it again for lunch money…
Re: How to get CREDIT SCORE? - Posted by B.L.Renfrow
Posted by B.L.Renfrow on April 06, 2000 at 23:27:07:
If you have a friendly local mortgage broker, they should be willing to pull it for you.
Or you could get an associate to do it through one of the on-line services for a small fee. Note, however, that you cannot personally order a report on yourself through those services.
Shawn is correct; the “consumer” versions of the reports are not scored.
The only way to get your credit score is to apply for something. Just make it somewhere you can go in like a car dealer or mortgage company, not a credit card. Credit scores are for making a credit decision so it is given to credit grantors only. For some reason a car dealer and a mortgage company seems to always have different scores. Not a big difference but different.
I also recently ordered my credit report and noticed a number of credit inquiries from various credit card companies. I wondered if that would have any effect on my rating. How can you control how many companies pull your report?
Thanks.
Zee- Although the gift certificates were nice, if a person is unemployed they can save a bus trip and have a free copy of their report sent to them from the bureaus without being turned down for credit. Some states like Colorado still allow any resident to get one free report a year.
You are entitled to one free report every 12 months upon request if you certify that:
(1) you are unemployed and plan to seek employment within 60 days,
(2) you are on welfare or
(3) your report is inaccurate due to fraud.
But, like you said you got a free catalog, a pillow and some cash to boot along with your free report;-}
P.S. I did the same thing in the past where I applied for a loan I knew I wouldn’t be approved for just to have them give me my report.