A competitor to Noddle?

[silverfox1961]

Most of us have heard of Noddle and I would suspect many are members however, another company is now offering free credit reports.

 

https://www.clearscore.com/

 

This company use Equifax to get your data so generally it will be reliable.

 

When I registered, it never asked me for any credit/debit card details. Just by answering a few questions and that was it.

 

I would suspect that if you haven't lived at your present home for long or not registered with the Electoral Role then you will have issues and you may need to add more data.

 

For me, it was very easy. Have a go, tell us how easy it was for you.

[obiter dictum]

Having used claer score i find the information they provide to be poorer than Noodle.

 

I have seven current active finance accounts and clear score only lists two

 

I moved to Northern ireland in July, Equifax and Experian now have my Northern Ireland address since i went on the electoral register, clear score still has my UK address

 

I believe Clear score are an off shoot of Equifax

 

They are a new company so they can only get better but if you want a free credit reference service provider

 

Stick with Noodle for the time being

 

Sign up for clear score and be prepared to be email spammed to death as they match your credit profile with "Preferred partners"

[maroondevo52]

 

Sign up for clear score and be prepared to be email spammed to death as they match your credit profile with "Preferred partners"

 

One of the reasons I didn't proceed with my application.

 

Now I keep getting e-mails saying 'hey, you haven't finished what you started'

[citizenB]

So how are they populating their records, SF ? By using Equifax data - or waiting whilst people join up for the free service and providing the information for them !

[sillygirl1]

I tried using Clearscore but their systems could not 'recognise' me on Equifax - probably because so little is now registered! I haven't had anything to do with credit since about 2008/2009 so there is nothing against my name.

 

Even Equifax have asked for a raft of ID from me, which I've told them I won't be sending.

 

The whole credit search system isn't really fit for purpose anymore (IMHO) and needs to have a major re-design. 'Earning' a credit score is crazy, why 'Earn' something that you don't particularly want or need is baffling.

[silverfox1961]

So how are they populating their records, SF ? By using Equifax data - or waiting whilst people join up for the free service and providing the information for them !

 

All I had to do was give my date of birth, my home address and click on the correct bank I use from a drop down list and that was that. I had one email to confirm my membership and I have received no further emails from them nor any spam.

 

They use Equifax to populate the records and they were very similar to Noddle with the exception of the credit score. Noddle gives a number between 1 and 5 whereas Clearscore gives a number out of 700.

My score is 440. The average score for my area is 460 against a national average of 380.

 

With Noddle, they have address links going back to when God was a child but on Clearscore, they have only my current and previous addresses.

 

As for searches, Noddle list them all whether they be hard or soft searches and you don't know which is which however on Clearscore they do. On my file it shows no hard searches butthe last 5 soft searches.

 

I believe it is beneficial to have both so to ensure the data held is correct

 

EDIT: On the account page you can opt out of marketing as well.

[citizenB]

Interesting, thanks SF

[minky93]

Out of the two I find Clear Score more informative & I opted out on the application to receive any marketing emails and so far I have only received the welcome email.

[Old Cogger]

I have had 2

[obiter dictum]

I still get them trying to push applications for a Vanquis card saying it matches my profile

 

I have had a Vanquis card now for the last 18 months

[May Fly]

Interesting, I'll probably have a look and see how things are for me.

 

To those who may be interested in using this or similar services but are worried about giving an email address, many email providers allow users to use an 'alias' email. This is another email address that is sent to your main email inbox. The advantage is that when you've finished with that alias and you don't want anyone contacting you, you can just erase it. Any emails sent to it will just bounce back as undeliverable. Or, you can of course set up another email and use that, and abandon it afterwards. The disadvantage is that you have to check that account as well as your 'real' one.

[fkofilee]

I was bale to get on easy... So im happy. Info is pretty reliable. So It gets my 2 Thumbs up of approval...

[maroondevo52]

Noticed Barclaycard are about to give a free Experian Credit Score when you have an account with them.

[smarties21]

I'm on my 2nd month with Noddle and my Clearscore account will be in its 2nd month tomorrow, so I don't have a great deal of experience with either, but I can give my initial impressions.

 

First of all, there was an address I didn't know attached to my account on Noddle. Either way, I immediately sent a message to Noddle about this and by the 2nd month (as both only update once a month as a "snapshot" of your account) the address I didn't know was gone. For this reason alone it's important for anyone to check the different credit reference agencies, especially if you've had problems getting credit or have ever had any issues with identity fraud in the past. I am kicking myself for not checking sooner!

 

Noddle is mainly the score out of 5, as has been mentioned before. It also has a credit score within one of its menus, but it doesn't say what it's out of. Instead it has an arrow stating whether they consider you to be Very Poor, Poor, Fair, Good, or Excellent. Meanwhile, Clearscore puts its own score front and centre. I don't pay too much attention to scores as they all have their own and it doesn't guarantee anything, but what I do like about Clearscore is that it clearly tells you the positive and negative things about your report. This mentions things like staying in your account limit, being on the electoral roll, and whether you have arrears or not are all things considered.

 

Both accounts are up to date for me in terms of what I owe. They show different soft searches - Noddle has money supermarket when I checked last year, and Noddle shows credit card searches that I later received mail in the post about (both a few months before Clearscore so nothing to do with them specifically). Noddle and Clearscore both use TotallyMoney to give you offers, however, they give different results. Despite knowing what cards you already own, Noddle will offer from the same company so you can't get it anyway, and Clearscore are overly optimistic. Take it all with a grain of salt.

 

I use a domain and give separate addresses for all companies I sign up with. There's been no spam off either yet, but Noddle have sent me more "get more out of your account" emails. It's early days though. If you use gmail, you can use aliases to track companies you don't trust, although not all will accept that format so it can be hit or miss (I once used that trick and the company did accept it to send me newsletters, but wouldn't when I tried to unsubscribe!).

 

To finish this off (sorry about the length), I just wanted to say that I didn't really care about an arbitrary score and I knew I was up to date with my accounts so I had no reason to check. I'm so glad I changed my mind. The information I wanted to remove was on Noddle (Callcredit), but it could just as easily been with Clearscore (Equifax). I will be checking my Experian report soon to make sure there's nothing that shouldn't be there as well. I now think it's a good idea to have an idea about what all the agencies have on you, just in case.

[Andyorch]

Many thanks for your in depth analyses and feedback smarties21.

 

Regards

 

Andy

[maroondevo52]

I just registered and have to say I find Clearscore better than Noodle, only shows data up to September this year but on a par with Noodle.

 

One big plus is in my closed accounts as it does not show any Pay Day Loans which I've had some years ago.

They also give some good advice about understanding your credit file and ways of improving it over time.

[silverfox1961]

I also find it quite good. Having a 'proper' number as a score instead of a 1 - 5 that Noddle do is more informative.

 

What people should be doing when registering is making sure they read everything before clicking 'next' and make sure that all boxes that give opt outs be ticked otherwise expect your email to get loads more 'offers'

 

I have been registered for over 5 weeks now and I made sure that I didn't inadvertently agree to spam so the only offers I get is when I sign in. No spam, nothing. All I get is my monthly alert to say that my credit file has been updated (even though it hasn't changed)

 

Has anybody else noticed that since Clearscore came on the scene, Noddle have advertised on TV?

[sillygirl1]

Because I haven't used credit in a long time both Experian and Equifax want additional information from me to 'make sure we are dealing with the correct person'.

 

Needless to say I am not 'helping them help me get the credit I deserve' as I actually don't want credit!

[audiobookman]

I also find it quite good. Having a 'proper' number as a score instead of a 1 - 5 that Noddle do is more informative.

 

 

Noodle does give a number but im now 100% sure its taken out of thin air, if you look at the full report it will give 1-5 but a number under it. Mine is 554 (2) where it has stayed for over a year, even though i payed off two loans - stayed in the black, payed of a large proportion of my mortgage, and the one and only default fell off in july (SB).

[Myfamily]

Hi All,

 

A little confused by this don't know if anyone can enlighten me?

 

I signed up for clearscore and a lot of accounts that apear on Noddle are not on it, the main one being First PLus which is a second charge and huge - it is showing under "closed accounts" my noddle report was last updated on 10 Nov but on clearscore it says it was updated on 8th Nov.

 

Another strange thing is that I have a charging order too which doesn't appear on either account - shouldn't that come under CCJ's on both?? (not that I'm complaining!)

[Andyorch]

Charging Orders dont appear on your CRA,s My Family.

 

Andy

[Myfamily]

Ah Really? I didn't realise that, I thought they were CCJ's and then became charging order? - oh well as I said - not complaining, probably a good thing that it's not there! Any thoughts on the other account, seems weird to me.

[Andyorch]

No a Charging order is a court order to act as security against the judgment.....the CO has no financial value....hence its not on the CRA,s.

 

Really no Idea as to your other dilemma...is it not over 6 years old?

[caro]

I just got my second report from clearscore which has 9 positives and one negative which has brought my meaningless score down slightly.

 

Apparently the negative issue is because I have repeatedly gone over a cc limit in the last 12 months - except I haven't. I've been under my limit every month, but this month I transferred a chunk off this particular card to a new interest free one, then contacted them to reduce my limit. I have probably been over my new limit every month - but never the limit for the relevant month..