Monday, July 2, 2012

Credit monitoring can protect you from identity theft

This century has seen phenomenal technological advancement and technology has touched every aspect of our life. Financial transactions are no exception and the use of credit cards and debit cards has become very common place. Paper currency is being used less by people today because of the inconvenience of carrying large sums of money with them all the time. Credit cards are accepted everywhere, be it malls, restaurants, movies or pubs. Thus, credit cards are the more convenient way of shopping and leisure.

With technology comes the negative side and identity theft has come in line with the increase in use of credit cards. The credit card thieves are getting smarter by the day and they are coming up with smarter and less obvious ways of identity theft and credit card misuse. This is why proper credit monitoring and credit report scanning is called for by a credit monitoring service.

 
Before you hire any credit monitoring service, you should first understand what the service can do and cannot do to protect you from identity theft. Having a credit monitoring service check and keep up with your credit status protects you from identity and credit card theft. The credit monitoring agency sends you constant alerts about any changes in your credit report, credit score or credit card usage. You get these alerts in the form of text messages, emails and phone calls. These alerts are instant and if you are sure that, you have not made any purchase or applied for any loan then you can block your credit card to prevent further misuse.

Most of the credits monitoring agencies update the credit status every 24 hours. The fee charged by the agency will differ depending on the level of monitoring. The average credit monitoring fee should fall somewhere between $10 to $15 per month. For this amount, you can avail decent credit monitoring service with a credit report as well as credit score. While most of the credit monitoring services will provide only one credit report, there are some who may provide all three for a higher fee.

It is best to get access to all the three credit reports because each one has something different to offer. Having all the credit reports and all three credit scores through credit monitoring ensures complete protection from identity theft and credit card misuse. If you want to take protection against identity theft and credit card misuse a step further then you should ensure that you carefully review all your bank statements and credit card reports. If anything seems suspicious then you should immediately bring it to the notice of your bank.

Credit monitoring has made it easy for credit card owners to stay connected with their credit details. With the constant alerts from the monitoring agency, the credit card owner will start to identify credit fraud and he can protect himself from identity theft sooner than before. Credit monitoring has taken credit card safety and protections a step further.

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