Bad Credit History: How it Impacts Your Life

Most of the Americans even don’t realize that bad credit history not only hinders to take a loan, but also to get a job.
According to the research published by Visa USA only 20% of Americans know that the employer has the right to cancel the potential employee application if the latter has bad credit history, and it will be legal. 52% believe, by mistake, that the potential employer can’t use the credit history as the criterion of hire, and 28% of them are not sure if their opinions are correct.
Visa’s research also shown that 42% of consumers aged 18 and more never inquired about their credit history and thus, they even don’t have an idea whether it’s bad or good. Moreover, men used to check their credit history much more seldom; the same is true in case with people aged 55 and more.
Over time, credit history became a very important criterion in modern life since it may have an impact almost on everything, from getting a job to purchasing a house. Even highly skilled specialists may face the problem of unemployment because of bad credit history.
Some extra results of this research include the following points:
* women (59%) inspect credit history more frequent than men (51%);
* people aged 55 and more (43%) inspect credit history more seldom than young citizens (62%);
* only 22% of those taking part in the survey inspect credit history annually;
* only 18% of them inspect credit history two and more times a year.
A credit bureau keeps data records of your credit lines (in case you have any), the scope of credit available to you, how many times various potential creditors inspected your credit history, how long you are living on your current address and how often you have paid off your bills in good faith.
What spoils your credit history? You should take into account all of the following points:
* Frequent resettlements. If a person moves too often, he/she is regarded as unreliable.
* Many short-term credit lines or the absence of a long-term credit lines. Using one account for a long time is favorable for creditors and banks. If there is no annual fee charged for use of a credit card, I strongly recommend you to keep it. In some cases people tried to increase their credit scores by closing all of their accounts, but the effect was converse.
* Many new credit lines. The more credit cards you get, the lower your score is.
* Refusal to your application. Every time when you apply for a credit card and the creditor refuses all of these cases are included into your credit history.
* Overdue debts.
* Outstanding credit lines. If you don’t pay off for a certain period of time the creditor sells your debt to a collection agency. Only bankruptcy is supposed to be worse than this aspect.
When getting a credit card, for instance, you should better apply to an issuer at first: what would they do if your credit history is bad? Refuse at once? Offer a credit card which is developed especially for the customers with bad credit history? There is always an option regarded as the most acceptable and optimal: a secured credit card. There are always some ways to improve your credit history.

About the Author:
Anita Paasivirta is a competent advisor. Most of her articles are dedicated to various credit card deals. See also her work on credit score.