If I Change My Name, Will It Affect My Credit Report?

Your name is one of the most important parts of your identity. It’s how people know who you are, and it’s how you introduce yourself to the world. But what if you want to change your name? Will that affect your credit report? And if it does, is there anything you can do about it? In this useful clear credit article, we’ll answer all those questions and more. So keep reading to learn more!

If you get married, divorced, or change your name, you’ll almost certainly have two credit reports – one in your old name and one in your new name. Because Equifax has processes in place to connect different credit files for the same person, this is rarely a cause for worry. If you order a Credit Report from Equifax, each report will be sent under both of your previous and current names.

You don’t have to notify the credit bureaus if you want to legally change your name for reasons such as marriage, divorce, gender transition, or another reason. Information about your accounts comes directly from creditors in the form of personal information that is kept with them, such as credit card companies and student loan lenders among others. When new information regarding your personal information stored with a creditor becomes available, it should eventually appear on your credit report.

You can dispute incorrect information—such as misspellings, for example, or incorrect names that appear in your credit file as a result of fraud—while you can’t remove accurate previous names from your credit reports. To dispute a name on your report, each credit bureau that contains the wrong data should be contacted. Make sure to examine all of your credit reports to determine which ones contain the wrong data.

If you have defaults, fraudulent enquires or court judgements, listed on your credit file that is inaccurate, then contact the credit repair experts at Clear Credit Solutions. We will do a free credit file assessment to determine what exactly is on your credit report and whether we are able to help remove the listing from your report. We will never put you in a worse position – so don’t hesitate to get in touch today!