Building Credit without Building Debt?

[tigergem]

I just happened to run across this while I was looking for something else, and thought it might prove helpful to some.

"WilliamPaid's Bill Verification service, and WilliamPaid
will verify and report your past payments for monthly
recurring expenses, such as rent, utilities, cable, mobile
phone service and others, to the credit bureau. Get each
account verified for up to three years for one low price.

Verify one bill or many and turbo charge your credit file and score."

WilliamPaid's new website (www.williampaid.com) offers an easy, accountable way for renters to:

* Pay rent online with multiple, flexible options
* Manage rent payment collections among roommates
* Build credit while paying rent by reporting monthly rent payments to a credit bureau to build creditworthiness
* Track credit scores with credit reports and credit score monitoring
* Earn cash back for referring friends or shopping for household goods online
* Use cash back to pay off student loans and receive 10% matching contribution from WilliamPaid
* Use proactive and reactive roommate tools such as shared bill management, message boards, customizable roommate lists, and interactive roommate agreements


Read more: http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/s...#ixzz0iI0kEe3W

I have no affiliation with williampaid or earthtimes and have no idea if this idea actually works. Just surfed on in.

[BobMango]

Interesting TG. After digging around some I didn't really find any problems with this. I was thinking this might be nice to pay my rent not only for the credit scoring, but my debit card offers points so I can rack up some credits for that.

The down side is that the minimum cost is $4.17 a month, so you're looking at about $60 a year for the service. That's more than some annual fees for credit cards, less than others, but as you point out you are rebuilding credit without risking more debt.

The one thing I'd like to see is how it actually shows on your credit report.

[tigergem]

Well that is the point that doesn't have me sold. I have been grilling their staff on a lot of the finer points of the service. Apparently they only report to one CRA and that is PRBC, Inc. And PRBC, Inc. is a "supplemental" credit report that "might be" requested if your EXP, EQ, TU reports are "thin", but it is not automatically provided when somebody pulls your credit. So I'm not 100% convinced that this is worthwhile. I'm thinking about pulling my PRBC credit report, just to see what it looks like before I even think about signing up for this. I saw another service that will capture and report your Chapter 13 and your rent payments, but they were quite a bit more expensive than this one.

[LSUTiger32]

Yeah I doubt that they can really make this happen. Utility companies though and your landlord should both be more than happy to write you a credit reference letter which is just fine when applying for a mortgage. Other than that, I think everyone knows my stance by now.

[LALADY]

WOW, look at their TOU.