Part of being an adult and engaging with the monetary system that exists in South Africa, is that financial institutions keep a record of your debt and your behaviour with regards to paying that debt back and share this information to a central registry. This central registry collates all this data into a single profile of your debt. We call this a "credit score" or "credit report".
Whenever you apply for a new debt, the financial institution who is considering loaning you money will be able to access your credit profile and will use this to build a story about you and whether they can take the risk of loaning you money and trust that you will pay it back.
Your Rights
It's your right to be able to access the information on your credit report so that you can know how you're being rated and take control of your rating through owning your behaviour in paying your debts back.
It's also beneficial to be able to check that your information is being recorded accurately, that you have not been the victim of an identity scam or credit fraud where someone else has taken on debt in your name, and that any accounts or debts you pay off are closed and recorded as being paid off.
Your Options
There are many different company's that track and monitor your financial information pertaining to debt and provide you access to such information. We're going to share two options below.
ClearScore
ClearScore is a free online portal through which you can get your credit score as well as list of all debts recorded against your name. It also offers tips around the factors used to calculate your score, and how you can improve it.
Disclaimer : This website does try to sell you new financial products including credit cards and loans. We ONLY recommend using it for the purposes of getting an idea of your score and looking at the data used to calculate such. We DO NOT recommend that you take up any of the offers they will tempt you with. We also recommend you go to "Account", "Communication" and disable the communications about 'Features & News', 'Product Offers' and 'Research'.
TransUnion
TransUnion provides a free credit report once a year where you can get a comprehensive report about all of your debt information.
To Consider
Was there anything about your credit score or credit report that surprised you?
When you're ready, "Mark Complete" to finish this topic and go back to "Mark Complete" the Lesson on Debt.
We LOVE cookies! If we could offer you real cookies to munch whilst you browse our site, we would. Until that's virtually possible we have to inform you that we use browser cookies on our site to give you the most relevant experience. Please click “Accept” to confirm you consent to the use of ALL the cookies.
This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may affect your browsing experience.
Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. These cookies do not store any personal information.
Any cookies that may not be particularly necessary for the website to function and is used specifically to collect user personal data via analytics, ads, other embedded contents are termed as non-necessary cookies. It is mandatory to procure user consent prior to running these cookies on your website.
Report
There was a problem reporting this post.
Block Member?
Please confirm you want to block this member.
You will no longer be able to:
See blocked member's posts
Mention this member in posts
Invite this member to groups
Message this member
Add this member as a connection
Please note:
This action will also remove this member from your connections and send a report to the site admin.
Please allow a few minutes for this process to complete.
