Providing a credit report to letting agents - how to explain something sketchy?

coffeecrisp

So basically I am trying to rent a flat. My credit is fine, it's the average for my area. I have 2 credit cards which I've paid off in full every single month I've had them. I've never been late on any bill payments. All good.

I just downloaded my full report of Noddle as instructed. The problem is that last year, I decided to do a bit of matched betting. I made about £100 in a 2 months and decided it wasn't worth the hassle. But of course, now the report shows AML checks from six (!!!) bookies. I've never so much as bought a lottery ticket.

So should I just send the report and see what happens, or should I send it along with an explanation of what I was doing to get out in front of it? They have a copy this month's bank statements so they can see there's no gambling transactions. I do put most of my daily spending on my CC, so they see the CC payments, maybe they'll think the bookie payments are in there?

I'm really freaking out because I searched for so long and finally found the perfect place. What do you all think?

Gary123456790

Why not give them a copy of your credit card statement also, or just give them what they ask for and if they ask for more information then provide it - as it was one period of betting only and you can prove you don't do it any longer I doubt it will cause major issues.

Pixie5740

I'm not sure I would hand over a credit report to a letting agency. I would let them run a credit check on me because all they would then see are my public credit files (CCJ and insolvency, that's it). Is this letting agency charging you a fee to be referenced? Is demand for rental properties in the area extremely high? If it's just an average property for the area I'd be inclined to look elsewhere with a less invasive letting agent.

jonnygee2

My experience is that most estate agents ask for these as an excuse to charge both you and the landlord some absurd extra fee. They probably don't even read it. If they do I'd bet the scan for CCJs and maybe check there's no extensive credit card debts etc, but not much more. I doubt any of the estate agents I have dealt with are thorough enough to pick up on a few gambling transactions last year.

Personally, I'd never give this level of personal information to an estate agent anyway. If you are comfortable with doing so, I don't think you'll have any issues.

steampowered

I don't think it matters. What they are really looking for are outstanding CCJs or past bankruptcies.

I think it is unlikely you'd even get asked about searches. Even if you did get asked, you have a perfectly reasonable explanation.

lewishardwick

I've never had a letting agency ask for my credit file. They all ran credit checks (at my expense).

Sounds like a cheap outfit trying to scrimp on their costs.

takman

Its pretty stupid of them to ask you to supply a copy of your credit report, it would be so simple for you to edit it and remove anything you wanted before you gave it to them that it's basically worthless to them.

coffeecrisp

I agree with all the posts above. I'm not really happy about having to give all that over. I can't really look for another place. It's a major city. Renting is crazy here, some of my friends have been trying for months.

They did give me the option to pay for an "extensive" credit check, or provide them with bank statements, wage slips, and this credit report. As I'm a student working part-time, I need a guarantor. The extensive credit report was £30 each, and I don't really want to spend £60 on that if we can just hand the documents over.

I guess the best course of action would be to hand the documents over and carefully monitor my credit report afterwards, just in case something dodgy happens?

anselld

Better to pay for the extensive report. It might be expensive but it is anything but extensive.

nyermen

mortgageFTB wrote: »

When letting agents run ‘credit checks’ all they see is public information (e.g. bankruptcy, ccj notices).

This exactly. Letting agents have no access to your credit file as they're not a "provider of credit" themselves. What they call a credit check is just the public information..

coffeecrisp

anselld wrote: »

Better to pay for the extensive report. It might be expensive but it is anything but extensive.

I live in Scotland and as far as I can tell, asking to pay for a credit vet is illegal. I think they get around that by offering this "DIY" option.

Do you think there is any way I can get a copy of a credit report similar to what they would see?