Credit Monitoring? Waste of time?

[VanWinkle]

I had someone open a card in my name 6-7 years ago and after getting the card cancelled, I froze my credit along with a fraud alert. The fraud alert required a police report at that time. I have had no further problems and continue to have the credit frozen. I do get updates on my score from Capital One Credit wise.

 

[audreyh1]

I had one that was "free" to me due to a data breach. When I opened up a Fidelity credit card last year, I got notified 3 weeks later.

Useless.

You can’t expect that you will be notified immediately, that’s not how it works.

But even with 3 weeks you still have plenty of time to handle a fraudulent account opened with your credentials.

I had credit monitoring well before we finally froze our credit. I still like to get notifications and review reports even though it’s very unlikely that someone can open an account with our credit frozen.

 

[pacergal]

We have our credit frozen.
If involved in a breach, I will sign up for the free one year. Otherwise, I monitor my own.
I have notifications, by text and email, for just about everything on my debit and credit cards (deposits, transfers, online pay, charges over a certain amount, foreign charges, whatever is available )

 

[COcheesehead]

I freeze, I monitor, I transfer lockdown, I use security at the device, account and global level. To me it’s all easy stuff. I just think of the consequences if something were breached. Ick.

 

[pook]

Credit freeze, and never save payment info on website has worked for me 90% of the time. Did get hit by a card skimmer at a gas pump a few years back. Fortunately was a credit card, so I didnt lose anything.

 

[RetireBy90]

I also have freeze for both of us on the 3. (Previous post about big 4?) I had o e card that I raised limit couple years ago, I got them on phone, asked which they used, unfroze while they checked, then froze again all in 2 or 3 min.

I get monthly scores from Wells, PenFed, and Amex. All get the numbers from different agencies so I get all 3.

 

[GenXguy]

We have frozen all of our credit agencies but it bit me in the butt a couple weeks ago. I had signed up for the Prime card for the $200 bonus and thawed Experian and Transunion for a day. Everything worked fine. During Prime days, they bumped the bonus to $250 so I asked my wife if she wanted her own card and she did. I thawed Experian only, because I thought that was the one they had pulled, and she was denied with no ability to know why. 8 days later a letter arrived saying the denial was because they couldn't access her Transunion. Oops. Now the bonus is down to $150 and not worth the time.

I did the Prime card sign-up as well. First it told me my credit was frozen. So I unfroze at all 3 credit reporting agencies, then the sign-up went through. Got instant approval after that and my $250 gift card which I instantly spent. lol

 

[Closet_Gamer]

We just keep our credit frozen.

Our card numbers have been stolen a few times. PITA but I’m amazed at how fast the cc company catches it and issues us a new number/card. They’ve gotten very good at updating saved merchants with the new numbers.

I also use a virtual card number from our cc company for all online shopping. If it gets compromised and we need to change it, no impact on the number on the card itself.

 

[grasshopper]

I have found that the free Credit Wise from Discover has been right on with their scan of the dark web. Chase seems a bit slow with their alerts.

 

[GenXguy]

I was warned sometime in the last couple years from at least a couple of these when my info was in one of the wide scale compromises of data that was discussed in a thread here. I also got a couple emails that alerted me about the credit inquiry when I recently got my Prime Visa card. It's funny, I had 2 Chase cards and 1 Discover, but since the Prime card is actually a Chase card, I have 3 Chase cards now. At least I can access them all on the website for review/payment.

 

[OldShooter]

Thanks for the inputs. One thing I realize is that part of the reason for my silence from the monitoring services is that it has probably been a decade or more since I applied for any kind of credit card. (I did, however, freshen up a HELOC three years ago; no notices about that though.)

 

[Dalton]

If you haven't logged in to the credit agencies lately, you should probably do that. When I froze my credit after the Experian breach (2017?), it was done on the telephone and they gave a long number. I got notice of another breach a couple years ago, and went to check in with the 3 credit agencies online, and had to basically create new accounts with usernames and passwords. But they offer notifications, that you can tell them how to communicate with you and all that. It's not a bad thing to get an email from them every month, even if it just says "nothing new to report on your credit report." In fact, when I logged in a couple weeks ago, before going to buy a new vehicle, one of the agencies had unfrozen my credit (or I screwed it up a couple years ago).

 

[pjm-7]

As a former tax auditor I can tell you that unemployment insurance fraud is a big one. Years ago everyone applying for unemployment insurance benefits had to go to their local employment office and apply in person. Now everything is pretty much done online. During the pandemic my younger brother, a very employed attorney received a 1099 from the state of Ohio that he had collected benefits during 2020. PITA to correct and prove that he was working.

Also, people have been known to establish a "business", register with the state and do payroll reporting for fictitious employees. In a short period of time they collect benefits on the fictitious employees and pocket the money. There is more this scam that is more that anyone would care to read.

 

[Anchors Aweigh1]

With the never-ending cascade of popular web sites that get hacked, it seems that I always have "free credit monitoring' services active. I get one or two status notifications every month. The thing is, the notices always (like 100%) say that they have nothing to report. This has been going on for at least several years. I do not have my credit locked, though a number of years ago I opted out of new credit card offers, which made my mail box happy. I don't check my credit score very often, but it seems to run in the 830 range.

So, is that the case for everyone? Nothing to report? It seems like a waste of time and money.

Freeze your credit best protection

 

[meleana]

With the never-ending cascade of popular web sites that get hacked, it seems that I always have "free credit monitoring' services active. I get one or two status notifications every month. The thing is, the notices always (like 100%) say that they have nothing to report. This has been going on for at least several years. I do not have my credit locked, though a number of years ago I opted out of new credit card offers, which made my mail box happy. I don't check my credit score very often, but it seems to run in the 830 range.

So, is that the case for everyone? Nothing to report? It seems like a waste of time and money.

With the never-ending cascade of popular web sites that get hacked, it seems that I always have "free credit monitoring' services active. I get one or two status notifications every month. The thing is, the notices always (like 100%) say that they have nothing to report. This has been going on for at least several years. I do not have my credit locked, though a number of years ago I opted out of new credit card offers, which made my mail box happy. I don't check my credit score very often, but it seems to run in the 830 range.

So, is that the case for everyone? Nothing to report? It seems like a waste of time and money.

I don't do any of that either.

 

[schellem]

Not to me. We pay for it independently of any reported breach.

Usually there isn’t anything to report which is good. Occasionally we are notified if a new account has been opened or there has been an inquiry on our credit. If it’s something we did, that’s good. Otherwise we’d have to find out what happened.

And we do also keep our credit frozen.

I've looked at some of these and the fee's seem to be ridiculous. I just keep freeze on our accounts.

 

[frank05]

Only thing we have done is to round robin the credit agency reports every four months. Never any issue except about twenty years ago where a someone at a local restaurant sold my cc info. I got a call from the issuer just as I arrived home. We have started to use Apple wallet everywhere it is supported since it uses a virtual number.

One thing I hope is that US restaurants adopt the international model and bring the card scanner to your table so you always maintain control of your card.

 

[Cerys]

I get it free due to the GSA breach, but it has never caught anything of significance. I think I've had it for 15 years or more at this point. My credit cards on the other hand regularly catch fraudulent charges, so that is good I guess. PITA when I have to get a new CC mailed to me though. Seems to happen every couple of years or so.

We had a credit card with Bank of America. Didn’t start out that way they bought it. They are not my favorite company. Late husband worked there — we called it Bank of Satan.

Anyhow, we had some bills that were running through it. Made our life easier when it was the old company which I believe was MBNA. Never had a problem. When Bank of America got their hands on it every six months I was getting a new card and having to change everything. Since we were using that as a business card, I ended up canceling our automatics out of it, and putting it on a separate card and running it through the business. And we were still getting fraud alerts and getting a new card and more fraud alerts and getting a new card.

It was like that until we made the decision to go to Costco which at the time was using American Express, and applying there and getting Costco American Express card.

I did the thing you’re not supposed to do, I closed the Bank of America card.

Since 2003 we never had to get a new card because of fraud. Costco have since switched to Citibank Visa, once again never had that problem. I have heard multiple complaints about how difficult it is to access information about your credit card — but I will take that over switching out all my automatics time and time and time again.

And even though it’s been a long time and my husband didn’t work there hasn’t worked there since 1995 — and he’s been dead for six years — if Bank of America buys a credit card that I have I will close that credit card because I do not want to deal with them.

 

[shafer9]

I get it free due to the GSA breach, but it has never caught anything of significance. I think I've had it for 15 years or more at this point. My credit cards on the other hand regularly catch fraudulent charges, so that is good I guess. PITA when I have to get a new CC mailed to me though. Seems to happen every couple of years or so.

I get hacked at least once a year…For the last 12 years. Never costs me anything

 

[JoeWras]

One thing I hope is that US restaurants adopt the international model and bring the card scanner to your table so you always maintain control of your card.

I've seen a very significant change over the last year with most of the local restaurants now doing this.

 

[audreyh1]

I've seen a very significant change over the last year with most of the local restaurants now doing this.

That’s amazing! I hope it spreads.

Over the past 2 years in the US, we would ask to pay with ApplePay and they would at least direct us to the register where there was a tap-to-pay type terminal.

 

[Car-Guy]

I don't check my credit score very often, but it seems to run in the 830 range.

My credit score has been running in the lower 800's for years but I canceled one of my three credit cards earlier this year and it dropped to around 790. Let's see, one less credit card to potentially use and my credit score goes down. Crazy.

 

[Closet_Gamer]

My credit score has been running in the lower 800's for years but I canceled one of my three credit cards earlier this year and it dropped to around 790. Let's see, one less credit card to potentially use and my credit score goes down. Crazy.

Ours has been dropping for no discernible reason.

It’s hilarious on one level. My recent college grad daughter has a higher credit rating that we do.

We haven’t had a negative credit event in decades. But we don’t use a lot of credit. No loans. Pay off the same two credit cards every month for over 10 years. Suffice it to say that we have sufficient assets to cover any realistic debt we might take on.

It’s really evidence that credit scores are more about whether you are a good credit investment than a good credit risk. Financial firms do best when you’re paying interest and late fees but not defaulting.

Have I mentioned lately how much I despise the financial services industry?

 

[TickTock]

It’s really evidence that credit scores are more about whether you are a good credit investment than a good credit risk. Financial firms do best when you’re paying interest and late fees but not defaulting.

Good insight!

 

[Car-Guy]

It’s really evidence that credit scores are more about whether you are a good credit investment than a good credit risk. Financial firms do best when you’re paying interest and late fees but not defaulting.

Have I mentioned lately how much I despise the financial services industry?

Absolutely, forget the fact that many of us are multimillionaires and only use CC for the convenience and cash back.