Beware comparison websites may damage your credit score!

Niglov

I just got my latest credit score from Noddle as I am applying for a new mortgage. I was shocked to see it had gone from Excellent down to Fair! Nothing has really changed in my cicumstances so I looked deeper in the report.

When I looked at the searches made on my account I found nearly fifty searches on three different dates made by just three companies. I didn't recognise their names but it was around the time I was researching new car insurance and had visited several comparison websites.

This number of duplicate searches appear to be the sole reason for my lower score. The websites must be doing a credit check for every company they offer!

Surely the only company who should do a check is the one I eventually get a quote from and purchase the policy?

I have disputed the checks online and written to Noddle and wait to see what happens.

GingerBob_3

Niglov wrote: »

I just got my latest credit score from Noddle as I am applying for a new mortgage. I was shocked to see it had gone from Excellent down to Fair! Nothing has really changed in my cicumstances so I looked deeper in the report.

When I looked at the searches made on my account I found nearly fifty searches on three different dates made by just three companies. I didn't recognise their names but it was around the time I was researching new car insurance and had visited several comparison websites.

This number of duplicate searches appear to be the sole reason for my lower score. The websites must be doing a credit check for every company they offer!

Surely the only company who should do a check is the one I eventually get a quote from and purchase the policy?

I have disputed the checks online and written to Noddle and wait to see what happens.

In the world of credit reporting and checking anything goes and there's little you can do about it. Contrary to popular belief you don't need to give consent for a company to blag you with a credit check (and this time next year they'll all be shafting you again). As a result of this credit check abuse, standard practice should be to enter bogus, but realistic, data into the comparison sites first time around. Only when you're ready to go should you put in the real stuff, and then ideally by going direct to the provider and not via the comparison site.


Others on here will tell you these checks aren't visible and count for nothing. :rotfl::rotfl:

awolo1

They don't count towards anything. It's all over this site.

They are soft searches only you and the CRA see them, unless of course you apply for credit facility, which is different.

davidsuffolk

Same thing happened to me. I use a comparison site to check car insurance at renewal and for some reason known only to them Hasting Direct always did a credit search.

While I realized it was only a soft search I thought why the hell should they as I had never used them and they weren't even at the top of the search so I asked their data controller why.

Their answer was that I had consented in the comparison site's T & C so pretty much "tough luck".

HOWEVER they failed to answer me within their agreed timescale and sent me £25 as compensation!

Niglov

People say they are "soft searches" and they don't matter but they do!

My score dropped fron Excellent (5/5) to Fair (4/5). Nothing has changed with my financial situation and it can only be the 50 or so searches made on me by the comparison sites, in a very short space of time, that has caused it.

There is no other explanation.

Niglov

Yes, davidsuffolk, Hastings were one of the guilty parties!

If it is one of the T&C's of comparison websites then they should warn users more clearly that using them may affect theit credit score.

Either that or the practice should be outlawed.

Gaz83

You don't have a credit score.

[Deleted User]

Niglov wrote: »

There is no other explanation.

Unless....unless your credit score is an entire work of fiction and whether the soft searches affect it or not is irrelevant?

Could it be that?

Nah. Someone would surely have mentioned it by now.

Niglov

If that is the case, zx81 and Gaz83, then why does my mortgage broker ask me to provide it for my loan application? Is it because he likes to read fiction???

Similarly, I recently opened an account at The Halifax. They ran a check on my credit rating. Maybe they just like to waste time?

Sensible answers please!

YorkshireBoy

Niglov wrote: »

If that is the case, zx81 and Gaz83, then why does my mortgage broker ask me to provide it for my loan application? Is it because he likes to read fiction???

Similarly, I recently opened an account at The Halifax. They ran a check on my credit rating. Maybe they just like to waste time?

Sensible answers please!

You need to change your mortgage broker if he's basing any recommendations on a Noddle credit score!

What kind of Halifax account? If a current account, then that's the reason Noddle have reduced your number...not unrecorded enquiries, even 50 of them!

Have you ever thought that Noddle will change the algorithms to reflect what they think lenders like to see, on a month by month basis?

toniq

Niglov the credit score is too show you how you're judged by the agency, experian, equifax etc, each agency will have a different score chart.

The only thing that matters is the actual report itself, look down the credit report at your acct conducts, payment history,associations etc, make sure address details and everything tallys as it should do.

If nothing is adverse then your report is fine.