I’m tired of marketing. I’m tired of commercials. I’m tired of all the BS that gets slung around every day. Some of the worst are the ads regarding credit reports. They make it sound like knowing your credit score or *gasp!* being able to print it out will somehow save you money. I imagine their supposed exchange would go something like this:
Car Dealer: $25,000, 8%.
Buyer: But I know my credit score!
Car Dealer: In that case, $23,000 at 7%!
In reality, it would be more like this:
Car Dealer: $25,000, 8%.
Buyer: But I know my credit score!
Car Dealer: So do I, we just ran your credit. Here’s the printout. The price is $25,000, with a rate of 8%.
Seriously, what will “knowing your credit score going in” save you? How will you be able to “cut a better deal” if you know it? It’s not like they’re going to take your word for it because you walked in with a printout. And since when is printing it out a feature? If I can see it on my computer screen, I can print it out if I want to, so that’s hardly a selling point.
We’re all entitled to a free credit file disclosure every year, and you can get it for free at annualcreditreport.com. It does NOT shadily require you to sign up for some credit monitoring service that will slap you with bills if you don’t cancel immediately. I think there’s something seriously wrong when you have to dupe people into signing up for your billable service. If people won’t join your program on its own merits, maybe you should re-evaluate your business strategy.
