A credit account that is recorded on your credit report is known as a tradeline. Every account you have has a tradeline which has a record of your creditor as well as the money you owe. You must strive to understand tradelines and how they work in order to understand what potential lenders see when they look your record up.
Tradelines on Your Credit Report
If you have multiple revolving and instalment credit accounts, then you should know that every account comes with its own tradeline. What are these accounts?
Revolving Tradelines
These ones include lines of credit as well as credit cards.
Instalment Tradelines
They include loans such as the following:
- Student loans
- Mortgages
- Personal loans
- Car loans
A tradeline also records information about your account. This information is also important to any potential lenders. Aside from your lender’s name and contact details, it also includes the following information:
- Type of account and partial number
- When the account was opened
- When it was closed (if this applies)
- The current status of the account
- The original loan amount
- Monthly payments
- Payment history
- Last activity on the account
Different lenders may differ in their reports which means that the information across the tradelines may not be uniform. However, all the best tradeline company will have the pertinent information relating to all your accounts should be available for viewing. In addition, the information provided for tradelines is usually the most recent.
Why Tradelines are Crucial
The records in your tradelines are what agencies use to calculate your credit rating. Your rating gives an idea of your solvency and while that is important to lenders, they need more information about the strength of your finances and your history of paying back your debts. That information is available in your tradelines.
Removal from a Tradeline
If you opt out of an account or want to remove someone that uses your credit card, you are allowed to do that. Consequently, the tradeline disappears from your credit record. This may, however, affect your credit score. If the removed tradeline had records that boosted your credit score, then that information is lost.
On the other hand, if the records showed that your credit card account was not highly ranked with regard to payment history, then that information is lost too. This is an advantage for you.
If there was fraud involved in the creation of an account in your name, you have the right to ask that the tradeline be removed. Should you discover that such an account exists, then you should act fast to have it taken down. This will have a positive impact on your credit since it is unlikely that such an account would have helpful information.
Conclusion
Tradelines provide a lot of information and can be instrumental in decisions that lenders make about funding you. You should therefore ensure that you check your information on a regular basis and request for any anomalies to be rectified immediately.
Regular checks will allow you to spot irregularities and have them taken care of before they mew your credit score up. You do not have to wait for the free annual report that you are entitled to.