Bureaus fined for credit score confusion

51w4H0Y7W7L._SX333_BO1,204,203,200_ The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau today ordered Equifax and TransUnion to pay more than $23 million in restitution and fines for deceiving consumers about the usefulness and actual cost of credit scores they sold to consumers. Regulators said the bureaus also lured customers into expensive subscriptions when people thought they were getting free scores.

The CFPB said the bureaus were selling scores without making it clear that they weren’t the FICO scores lenders typically use in their decisions. TransUnion was selling VantageScores and Equifax sold a proprietary score. (Important to note here that VantageScores are now offered for free by many sites, including my employer NerdWallet.)

Credit scoring can be complex, and people are easily confused about the different types of scores and how they’re used by lenders. For example, many people think they have one credit score, when in fact we have many, and those scores change all the time.

People often don’t understand that the scores they’re seeing aren’t necessarily the ones used by lenders. Most lenders use some version of the FICO credit scoring formula, but FICOs come in many different versions and iterations. There are different generations of FICO scores and formulas tweaked for different industries, such as credit cards or auto loans. Furthermore, the FICOs you get from one major credit bureau will differ from the FICOs you can get from the two other bureaus.

Before VantageScore, the bureaus often sold proprietary scores that were used by few, if any, lenders. That led consumer advocates to label these proprietary scores as “FAKO” scores. VantageScores definitely aren’t FAKOs, since they’re used by 20 of the 25 largest financial institutions. But they may be used behind the scenes–for marketing or testing, rather than for deciding whether you get a loan or the interest rate you’ll get.

A VantageScores can give you a general idea of how lenders might view you as a credit risk. If you’re in the market for a major loan such as a mortgage or auto loan, however, you should consider buying the appropriate FICOs from MyFICO.com to get the clearest idea of where you stand.

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