TransUnion Settlement to Let You Get Free Credit Score

According to a MarketWatch report yesterday, TransUnion, one of the three major credit report agencies, has settled a class action lawsuit which could mean free credit score and credit monitoring service for up to 9 months for millions. The lawsuit accused that TransUnion sold customer information to third parties for targeted marketing effort, an allegation that TransUnion denied.

Under the settlement, which still needs court approval, TransUnion agrees to provide about 150 million Americans three options:

1. Six months of TransUnion’s credit-monitoring service for free, giving consumers unlimited access to their credit reports and scores, and email notifications when changes occur on their credit reports. The settlement values this service at $59.75.
2. Nine months of the credit-monitoring service, plus access to the credit scores used in insurance decisions, and TransUnion’s mortgage simulator service, by which consumers can see how their credit score affects their mortgage rate. Value: $115.50.

The third option lets consumers take cash instead of the free services, but no payment will be made in at least two years, according to the MarketWatch report.

But don’t get too excited about the free credit score because it isn’t the FICO score that most lenders use when assessing one’s credit worthiness. It’s TransUnion’s proprietary score, which uses a difference scale than FICO score (could it be VantageScore which ranges from 501 to 990?). But still a free service won’t hurt, especially for those who will seek a loan in the near future.

If you want to participate in the settlement, go to ListClassAction.com (looks like the site is down when I last checked it) and register before June 16, or call (866) 416-3470.

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• Free Credit Report Time
• Factors Affect Credit Score Negatively

TransUnion VantageScore Credit Score and What’re Different from FICO Score

Every January, May, and September is free credit report time for us and we have been getting one credit report for free every four months from one of the three credit bureaus for many years, well before the law that made everybody eligible for a free report every calendar year. On January 3, I requested our annual reports from TransUnion, but this time I also ordered an extra item, a credit score, a VantageScore credit score to be exact.

Though I have purchased FICO credit score several times in the past, I always buy it through myFICO because FICO score is the standard that is widely used by lenders. Prior to January 3, I didn’t even know there exists a competitor called VantageScore, despite the *new* product has been around for more than a year Anyway, I didn’t cancel my order after being told that I will get VantageScore instead of FICO score. I wanted to see how the new score looks like. And here it is.

I was quite shocked to see my score at 916 because I usually get 700 something from FICO, then I realized that VantageScore uses a different score range than FICO’s which is normally between 300 and 850. If converted to the 300 to 850 range, my 916 score will be equivalent to 789, almost identical to the last FICO score I got in August. For VantageScore, whose score range is from 501 to 990, in addition to the score, it also assigns a grade:

• “A” credit: 901-990
• “B” credit: 801-900
• “C” credit: 701-800
• “D” credit: 601-700
• “F” credit: 501-600

Since this is the first time that I used VantageScore, I did a little research to get some background information on what exactly it is and how it is different from FICO score.

What’s VantageScore

According to Wikipedia, VantageScore was created by the three leading credit bureaus, Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion, to compete with FICO score, the dominant player in the credit score business. VantageScore was launched on March 16, 2006 and currently is offered by the three agencies. From VantageScore’s website, its features also include:

• Predicts the likelihood of future serious delinquencies (90 days late or greater) on any type of account;
• Consumer score is based primarily on a 24-month review of a consumer’s credit file;
• Includes up to four score factor codes and a fifth FACTA reason code;
• Can be accessed from all three CRCs;
• Does not consider “authorized-user” tradelines to assess credit risk.

The last feature, regarding authorized users, will actually be implemented in the latest update of FICO score formula.

Differences between VantageScore and FICO score

As a competitor to FICO score, VantageScore promises to offer “a highly predictive score with a consistent interpretation of consumer credit files across all three major credit reporting companies.” In addition to the 501 to 990 score range and 5 credit grades, VantageScore also takes a different approach in calculating credit score. According an article on Bankrate.com, VantageScore considers six factors, one more than FICO score:

From what I can see, VantageScore’s Utilization plus Balance is equivalent to FICO’s Amount owed and Types of credit uses, Depth of credit is similar to Length of credit history, and Recent credit is new credit. The only item that’s *new* is Available credit, but can’t it be part of Utilization?

What’s negative with VantageScore

As part of the credit score, VantageScore also listed what it considered as negative factors of my credit score:

1. The sum of your bank credit card account balances is too high: High credit balances may be considered by lenders to be a negative factor when determining creditworthiness. Paying down your balance may improve your score.
2. The amount paid on your open real estate accounts is too low: Having little paid down on some accounts may be considered by lenders to be a negative factor when determining creditworthiness.
3. Your average credit amount on open real estate accounts is too low: Having credit available to you is a sign that you are able to manage your finances responsibly. Lenders usually like to see that consumers have a large amount of credit available to them.
4. The balances on your open accounts are too high in comparison to their credit limits: It is a good idea to use your accounts regularly, but remember to keep your balances low in comparison to your available credit limits. Having a high ratio of balances to credit limits on open accounts may be viewed negatively by lenders.

They are quite different from those negative factors on FICO credit score reports, especially the two items related to “real estate account.” Honestly, I don’t really understand what “average credit amount on open real estate accounts” really means. If I am 5 years into a 30-year mortgage, the credit amount could still be low compared to the loan amount, though I have made on-time monthly payment from day one. Does that mean I am less “able to manage your finances responsibly”? I don’t think so!

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• Credit Score and Insurance Rate

Changes are Coming to Fair Isaac’s FICO Credit Score Calculation

According to an article on MSN Money published today, Fair Isaac, the creator of the popular FICO credit score, will adjust the way it calculate a person’s credit worthiness to better reflect “who’s a good risk and who’s a bad one” at the time when people intend to have, and use, more credit cards than before. Highlights of the upcoming changes in FICO 08 include:

Applying for new credit accounts may hurt less.

Having high balances on your credit cards could hurt more.

Actively using the credit accounts you have may be more important.

Having both revolving and installment accounts on your report could help you more, as the new formula is more sensitive to your ability to handle different types of credit.

Among the new changes, the one that I particularly like is getting more credit cards may not hurt my score much with the new formula, as I have been averaging 2 new cards a year for a quite long time. Though my own example has already proved to some degree that having dozens of credit cards all in good standing doesn’t hurt my credit score, it’s still a good news for someone like me who is active in the credit card arbitrage game

The article also offers some tips on how to get and maintain a good credit scores, such as lower the balance, don’t close old accounts and keep them active, etc. However, I won’t use those old cards that I haven’t used in years once every month as the article suggested just for the purpose of keeping them active. That will effectively create a nightmare when I pay the bills.

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• (Not Exactly) The Price of Credit Card Arbitrage: Marching toward 800

Credit Inquiries: Hard Pull and Soft Pull

The terms “hard pull” and “soft pull” often pop up when people talk about credit report, credit history, or credit inquiries. So what exactly are they and how do they affect credit scores?

The following are what I have found out.

What they are

“Hard pull” usually refers to credit inquiries that are initiated by you. When you, for example, apply for a credit card or a loan or sign up a new wireless service, the lender will run a credit check to determine whether to grant you the loan and at what rate. These inquiries are usually called voluntary inquiries.

However, not every voluntary credit inquiry will be treated as “hard pull.” For example, when I applied for the FNBO account last month, only “soft pull” was conducted. “Soft pull,” also known as involuntary inquiry, happens when creditors want to send you pre-approved credit applications, or when they want to verify the accuracy of the information you provide (in the FNBO case). Also when you check your own credit history, the entry will appear as a “soft pull” as well.

How they appear on credit reports

In the past year, I have obtained my credit reports from all three credit bureaus and they all report both “hard pulls” and “soft pulls”, though with slightly different terminologies.

TransUnion lists credit inquiries in two categories:

• Regularly inquiries: These are equivalent to “hard pulls” and will remain on the credit report for two years;
• Account review inquiries: These are “soft pulls” and according to TransUnion, companies use “soft pulls”

for the purpose of an account review or other business transaction with you. These inquiries are not displayed to anyone but you and will not affect any creditor’s decision or any score.

Experian shows credit checks as

• Requests viewed by others: These requests are usually “hard pulls” as they are

results of actions involving you, such as the completion of a credit application or the transfer of an account to a collection agency, application for insurance, mortgage or loan application, etc. Creditors may view these requests when evaluating your creditworthiness.

• Requests viewed only by you: These are “soft pulls” that are not available to creditors when they evaluate your credit.

Equifax displays inquiries in three parts:

• Inquiries in the last 12 months: These inquiries are

“hard” or voluntary inquiries and were generated because you authorized the companies listed to request a copy of your credit report. Most credit scores are calculated using only inquiries from the last 12 months. Your credit score is generally not affected by several inquiries that are posted at about the same time, such as when you shop for the best auto loan or mortgage rates.

• Inquiries that do not display to companies and do not impact your credit score: These are “soft” inquiries from previous definition. These inquiries are not shown to creditors and, thus, are not considered in credit evaluation.
• Companies that requested your credit file: This section is unique to Equifax as the other two don’t have a third category. What interesting is that it’s unclear whether the information under this category will affect credit score because Equifax says lenders “may view these requests when evaluating your credit worthiness.”

How they affect credit scores

From the descriptions above, we can see that “soft pulls” will not affect credit scores as those inquiries are not included in the information that is available to lenders. It’s the “hard pull” that will have an impact on credit score. According to the report I received from myFICO,

FICO scores only consider the voluntary inquiries listed on your credit report from the past twelve months.

Even that, a single inquiry is not going to have any significant impact on your credit score.

According to myFICO, the way FICO is calculating the credit score shows that new credit, which is the result of your voluntary inquiry, only counts 10% of the overall credit score.

Who performs hard pull

FatWallet.com has a list of financial institutions that perform “hard” credit inquiries when one applies for financial products other than a credit card or a loan. I consider this information useful when, for example, two banks offer similar products with same rates, but one does soft pull and one pulls a hard one, then I will choose the former over the latter. Also, if one plans to get a mortgage soon, then opening multiple checking/savings accounts or brokerage accounts from institutions that do conduct “hard” inquiries will affect the credit scores and, thus, the interest rates.

I edited the list (shortened it) to it only contains entries that are of general interests. Use the link above to access the complete list.

• American Express - for a One Financial account
• Ameriprise Insurance - for car insurance quote
• AT&T - for wireless phone account
• Bank of America - for checking/savings/MM/CD accounts
• Bank of New York - for checking/savings account
• Brown & Co. - for every account
• Chase Manhattan Bank - for checking account
• Cingular Wireless - for wireless phone account
• Citibank - for checking/savings/ e-Savings/CD account
• Comcast cable - for TV/high speed internet account
• Ebank - for checking account
• Everbank - for checking/money market account
• GMAC Bank - for money market account
• ING Direct - for Electric Orange checking account
• Presidential Bank - for checking account
• Schwab - for checking account
• Scottrade - hard pull on Equifax
• State Farm Auto Insurance - for auto insurance quote
• T-Mobile - for wireless phone account
• TD Ameritrade - for IRA account
• UFBDirect.com - for money market savings account
• Verizon - for phone/DSL/VoIP/wireless phone account
• Wachovia - for checking account
• Wells Fargo - for changing address or adding additional account holder on existing account

Featured information

Don’t worry about your college loans, take care of your loan financing today! Look into alternative student loans if traditional loan options don’t work for you.

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Free Credit Report and Fee-based Credit Monitoring Services

May 1st was the one of the three times in a year that we request a free credit report from one of the three credit agencies. We have been doing this, getting a free credit report every four months, for several years and it had worked out quite well for us. All I need to do is set up an email alert to remind me it’s time to pull a report. This time I got the report from Experian and my wife got her from Equifax.

To get your free credit report, be aware that the only authorized website for free credit report is AnnualCreditReport.com, which you can find on FTC’s website (click Consumer Protection -> Credit & Loans -> Credit Reports, or use this link, then you will find the Annual Credit Report link on the right). Also it has to be exactly 12 months since you obtained your last report from the same credit agency, not even one day earlier; otherwise your request will be denied.

With Annual Credit Report, you can only get a report for free, without a credit score. To get a credit score, you will have to use paid services. I usually get my credit score through myFico.com and use information from Equifax instead of from just any credit bureau so I can compare the changes over time. If you prefer to have both the credit report and credit score at the same time when getting your Annual Credit Report, you will have the option to add the credit score to your purchase with extra fees. For example, when I ordered my Equifax credit score from myFICO.com three months ago, I paid $15.95 for the report plus the score. If, however, you want to get your score at the same time you order your Annual Credit Report, you just need to pay $7.95 extra for the Equifax score. Seems to be quite a good deal.

There are many other places where you can purchase credit report, credit score and credit monitoring services. The following is a list of fee-based credit service providers I collected.

TrueCredit fro TransUnion

• Trial period: None
• What are offered:
  • Unlimited access to all three credit reports and credit scores
  • Notification within 24 hours of critical changes to all 3 reports
  • $25,000 ID Theft Insurance at no additional cost
  • No obligation, cancel anytime.
• Regular:
  • $14.95 per month

ScoreWatch from Equifax [Affiliate link]

• Trial period: 30 days free
• What are offered:
  • Continuous score monitoring and notification when a change in FICO score impacts the interest rate you are likely to receive
  • Daily monitoring of Equifax credit report with email notification of key changes
  • Two Free Score Power reports plus discounts on additional Score Power reports
• Regular:
  • $8.95 per month

CreditExpert from Experian

• Trial period: 30 days free
• What are offered:
  • Daily monitoring of your credit report and alerts of key changes alert you of potential fraudulent activity.
  • Unlimited access to Experian Credit Report and PLUS Score with paid membership.
  • Receive instantly personal credit report and credit score online
• Regular:
  • $9.95 per month
  • One-time purchase: 3-bureau credit report and a credit score for $34.95, Experian credit report and PLUS Score for $14.50

ScoreWatch from myFICO [Affiliate link]

• Trial period: 30 days free
• What are offered:
  • Credit monitors important changes to your FICO score and Equifax credit report
  • Alerts when important changes are detected
• Regular:
  • $89.95 annual fee

IdentityMonitoring from Citi

• Trial period: 30 days free
• What are offered:
  • Credit Monitoring every business day to keep track of your credit file activity
  • Alerts when there’s certain activity, allowing you to detect fraud
  • Credit report and score free with enrollment
  • 3-in-1 credit Report, score and monitoring access at no additional cost
  • Reimburse up to $25,000 of eligible identity theft recovery expenses
• Regular:
  • $12.95 per month

CreditKeeper from HSBC

• Trial period: 30 days free
• What are offered:
  • Unlimited access to your credit reports and score
  • Daily automated credit monitoring to alert you to changes on your credit reports
• Regular:
  • $9.95 per month

CreditSecure from American Express

• Trial period: 30 days free, for AMEX cardmembers only
• What are offered:
  • Unlimited access to 3-bureau credit report and Credit Scores from all 3 bureaus after the trial period
  • Daily monitoring of all three credit reports with an e-mail alert when critical changes are detected
  • Identity Theft coverage policy for up to $5,000 per occurrence
  • Track your score each month with Experian PLUS Score Trending
• Regular:
  • $11.99 per month

IdentityGuard from Costco

• Trial period: None
• What are offered:
  • 3-in-1 credit report & 3 credit scores
  • 3-bureau credit monitoring & alerts
  • Monthly credit report & score
• Regular:
  • $9.49 per month for Gold Star members and $7.49 per month for Executive members

PrivacyGuard

• Trial period: $1 for the first 2 months
• What are offered:
  • Credit report from 3 credit reporting agencies
  • Credit score instant access from 3 credit reporting agencies
  • Daily monitoring of credit
  • Up to $10,000 reimbursement for certain expenses you incur if your identity is stolen
• Regular
  • $129.99 annual fee
  • Single-bureau credit report for $9.99, three-bureau $34.99

PrivacyMatters

• Trial period: 7 days free
• What are offered:
  • Unlimited to 3-in-1 credit report
  • Triple credit scores, showing all three credit scores from the national credit reporting bureaus
  • Triple bureau credit monitoring with automated e-mail alert whenever new activity that may affect your credit report or credit score occurs
• Regular:
  • $29.95 per month
  • One-time purchase of 3-bureau credit report for $29.95

Featured information

Make sure to learn the latest information on bonds and other kinds of investments. Don’t fall behind on the personal finance news that affects you every day, always keep up to date on the happenings in the investment world.

The insurance quote gives full preview of the terms and conditions of an insurance company. If the debtors want to have fixation of their interest rates on the minimum level, there is a need of credit card consolidation. The dental insurance companies offer very reasonable rates of medical treatment of the dentists. The insurance quote of the various insurance corporations demonstrates the critical view of all pros and cons of manifesto of certain company.

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Class Action Settlement with Equifax and Fair Isaac (myFICO): Get 3 Free Months of Score Watch

I received this email notice this morning about the class action settlement for cases Hillis v. Equifax Consumer Services, Inc. and Fair Isaac Corp., Case No. 1:04-CV-3400 (USDC, ND GA) and Slack v. Fair Isaac Corp. and MyFICO Consumer Services, Inc., Case No. 1:07-CV-314 (USDC, ND GA):

You may be eligible to receive a benefit from a class action settlement if you purchased, paid for and received a credit score or credit monitoring offering from an Equifax website (Equifax.com), Equifax entity, Fair Isaac website (myFICO.com) or a reseller of the Suze Orman FICO® Kit between November 19, 1999 and February 8, 2007.

A federal court has directed that this notice be sent to inform you of a proposed class action settlement. Records show that you entered into an agreement with an Equifax and/or Fair Isaac entity (including through a website) between November 19, 1999 and February 8, 2007 to purchase one or more of the following “Offerings”: Score Power®; Credit Watch^TM; Score Watch^TM; 3-in-1 Monitoring; Credit Rankings^TM with Score Power®; Credit Rankings^TM with 3-in-1 with Score Power®; Credit Rankings^TM with Credit Report; Credit Rankings^TM with 3-in-1; 3-in-1 with Score Power®; Score Power® by mail; Credit Watch^TM by mail; FICO® Score (with Equifax, TransUnion or Experian reports); FICO® Deluxe; Suze Orman FICO® Kit; CreditSync; and Credit Advantage. If so, you may be eligible to receive a benefit under the proposed Settlement.

The Settlement will resolve two lawsuits in which claims are made that Equifax Consumer Services, Inc. (”Equifax”) and Fair Isaac Corporation (”Fair Isaac”) (collectively, the “Defendants”) violated the federal Credit Repair Organizations Act and similar state laws. Under the Settlement, the Defendants deny that they are liable, but have agreed to make certain changes to the Offerings and to the advertising and marketing of the Offerings. In addition, a Settlement Class member who purchased an Offering from one of the Defendants will receive 3 free months of Score Watch from that Defendant. A Settlement Class member who purchased an Offering from both of the Defendants will receive 3 free months of Score Watch from each of the Defendants for a total of 6 months of Score Watch. You will not be required to purchase anything. These benefits are truly free. All that is necessary is for you to fill out an Authentication Form to protect your privacy rights. Score Watch is a valuable benefit.

I have purchased two Equifax FICO scores from myFICO.com in the past year and that’s the reason why I received this notice. If you also have purchased any above mentioned product(s) from the defendents and like to participate in the settlement, here’s what you can do:

In order to receive the free months of Score Watch, you need only submit an Authentication Form either on-line or by mail. An Authentication Form may be obtained on-line at www.hillisslacksettlement.com, by calling 1-800-262-0454 or by sending a written request to the Settlement Administrator at Hillis Slack Settlement, c/o The Garden City Group, Inc., P.O. Box 9114, Dublin, OH 43017-4114. Your Authentication Form must be submitted on-line or postmarked (if sent by mail) not later than 75 days after the Effective Date. For more information on these deadlines, the Effective Date of the Settlement, the Authentication procedure, and the settlement benefits, you may visit www.hillisslacksettlement.com.

If you are eligible, the deadline to make a decision is May 4, 2007.

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What are We Complaining about?

The Federal Trade Commission yesterday released its annual report (click here to download the report) on top consumer complaints for 2006. The report found that for the seventh year in a row, “identity theft tops the list, accounting for 36 percent of the 674,354 complaints received between January 1 and December 31, 2006.” And consumers paid heavy price for fraud related losses. According to FTC data, consumers reported fraud losses of more than $1.1 billion in 2006, with a median loss of $500. The breakdown of 2006 complaints into 16 categories looks like this:

For ID theft, the 18 to 39 age group is especially vulnerable, accounting for 52% of all the ID theft complaints in 2006:

One way to fight ID theft is to stay on top of your credit information by checking your credit reports regularly for FREE, but make sure you get them from the ONLY authorized source, annualcreditreport.com. To prevent mis-spelling that could lead to places like freecreditreport.com (if you Google “free credit report,” you will find freecreditreport.com tops the search returns), go directly to FTC website, ftc.gov, and find the blue FREE Annual Credit Reports button on the left side. I order a report for both of us every four months from one of the three credit agencies instead of getting them all at once to maximize the benefit.

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Free Credit Report Time

For the past several years, we have been getting a copy of free credit report every 4 months (as NJ residents, we were eligible for a free report every year well before the law mandated a free credit report from all three credit agencies for everybody every 12 months). The last time I ordered a report was on September 2nd, 2006 from Equifax. When I woke up this morning and checked my email, I saw the first reminder of 2007: Get a credit report from TransUnion! Of course, you can choose to get all three reports at once, so you don't have to remember when to get what. I prefer to get one every 4 months. Though the free service is not as good as the paid ones with which you can monitor your credit continuously, it helped us to stay on top of the information.

To order yours, you should not try to Google "free credit report." The only authorized website for free credit report is AnnualCreditReport.com, which you can find on FTC’s website (on the left, there is a Free Annual Credit Reports button). Also it has to be exactly 12 months, not one day earlier.

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Free Equifax Credit Alerts for Paypal Users

Last night when I logged into my Paypal account to do some transfers, I noticed this new service before I went to my account page:

Since I have accessed my Paypal account for a while, I don't know exactly when this new service is available. But this does sound a good service if it's really free. Following the link, I went to a new page with little more information for what is being offered:

Registration process

After clicking the Sign Up button, I was brought to Equifax registration page. The registration process has four steps:

1. I provided my name and address,
2. I gave my social security number, date of birth and selected user name and password
3. Equifax used the information I provided to verify my identity (in my case, it asked who's my mortgage provider and the monthly payment)
4. After verifying my identity, Equifax showed the final payment page

which shows that the total cost for this service is indeed free. After I submitted the order, I also received an email from Equifax which again confirmed that I don't have to pay anything for it. Logging into the newly created account, I found the following credit alerts are included in this free service:

• Balance Amount Change
• Balance Percent Change
• New credit inquiries

and I can modify the balance amount change and percent change thresholds to my desired level.

Summary

Overall, the free service is not as advanced as other fee-based services that Equifax offers. But for the purpose of monitoring credit inquires and credit cards usages, it seems to be enough. And since it is only an alert, you can't really prevent the fraud from happening as it doesn't put a stop when, for example, a higher than threshold amount is about to be charged on your credit cards. The registration process is also quite simple. The only concerned I had was when I was asked to provided my SSN and DoB, though I went to the page through a link in my Paypal account. The order confirmation email was sent from Member.Benefits@equifax.com.

If you want to try this free service, you may find the link on the left hand side of you My Account page. 

If you enjoyed reading this post, subscribe to the RSS feed.

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Get a Free Credit Report Every Four Months

With the amendment to the federal Fair Credit Reporting, getting a free credit report has never been easier. Now everybody is eligible for one free credit report from each of the three credit agencies (Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion) every 12 months (has to be exactly 365 days, not even one day earlier, or you will be rejected). 

Starting this year, when the free credit reports became available for New Jersey residents, I set up an alart (use Yahoo Calendar) on January 1st, May 1st, and September 1st, to remind me to get a free report. Instead of getting all three reports at once, I request of a copy every four months from one of the agencies. In this way I can continuously monitor my credit throughout the year. Should there be any error, I don’t have to wait for a year to catch it.

Since there are tons of “free credit report” offers out there, you have to make sure that you get the real stuff you intend to get instead of some commercial products that are not free at all. Don’t try to Google anything like

"free credit report"

"free credit score"

"free credit check"

"one free credit report"

"free credit report online"

"free credit monitoring"

"free credit rating"

"free credit history"

because if you do, it’s likely you will end up in those dirty hands. The only authorized website for free credit report is AnnualCreditReport.com, which you can find on FTC’s website (on the left, there is a Free Annual Credit Reports button).

Enjoy your free credit reports!

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Lost in Transportation

After the phone call, I felt very bad. I really shouldn’t have been cheap.

Here’s what happened.

Early this month, I filled the paper work to move part of my Roth IRA assets from Scottrade to Vanguard. At the same time, my wife also submitted her application for transferring two Vanguard funds as well. Both applications were mailed on the same day.

Last Saturday, four prospects of four funds that I wanted to transfer out of Scottrade arrived, mailed directly by Vanguard instead of by Scottrade as before. I took that as a sign that they already received and processed my application. But what about my wife's? Since both applications were mailed on the same day from the same location, they should also have received it. However, there was no mail or email about my wife's application. Could it be lost in the mail? And the form has all her personal information, name, DOB, SSN, and bank account number, on it.

So I called Vanguard the first thing this morning and what I feared most had indeed happened: there was no any information about my wife’s application! Checked with name, SSN, address, and nothing showed up. I had sent mutual fund applications by regular mail dozens of times in the past, and all went through without any incident. Actually, when I was at the post office the other day, I thought about getting a delivery confirmation for the application (I wanted to make sure Vanguard, not somebody else, receives it), but that only applies to priority mail or parcel, not regular mail. And certified mail wouldn’t serve what I wanted either. In the end, I decided to go with regular mail instead of priority mail since there was no mishap before. And I just wanted to save a couple of bucks!

If I had spent four dollars more, I could have been assured that the mail reached its destination, instead of sitting here and worrying about what could happen with all my wife’s personal information. The damage may not as severe if the application was simply lost in the mail, but what if it gets into somebody else’s hands? Could she become a victim of identity theft? Should I start a credit monitoring service for her?

I just couldn't imagine the worst case.

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