Quick Guide to Inquiring Others’ Credit
Written by Dongmiao Cui   


If you are a landlord, you may want to screen your prospective tenant’s credit history. If you own a business, you may want to check the creditworthiness of your customer. In both, and many more cases, you need to conduct a credit inquiry on other people’s credit profile. Here is a step instruction that can help you get started.

Step 1: Get Permission and Information
You are required to obtain a written permission (sample) from the person you want to run background check on.  You are not allowed to check other people’s credit without permission from them.

Upon their approval, you need to ask them for their identifying information such as full name, social security number and address.

Step 2: Contact the Credit Bureaus
You can choose to call any of the three major credit bureaus. When you speak with their customer representatives, you will provide your own identifying information and tell them that you would like to buy someone else’ credit report with that person’s permission. Then you will be guided through the process to get the report.

Step 3: Notify the Person
By law you are required to notify the person if you will deny their credit based on their credit score or credit history.

Employer’s Credit Header
If you are an employer and wish to review your potential employee’s credit report (this is also known as credit header), you can get a modified version, which conceals account numbers to protect privacy. For employment purposes, the modified version focuses on demonstrating the employee’s integrity by showing how financially responsible he or she is. Same with other credit checks, a written permission from the employee is required.  




Last Updated on Tuesday, 21 December 2010 17:04