Credit Karma Review: Everything To Know About It

Credit Karma is a multinational personal finance company. You can use Credit Karma to manage your credits and financial transactions from this platform for free of cost. Apart from credit card management and personal finance this also known for free tax preparation. Credit Karma is a safe and trustworthy site where you can enter your bank details. You might be using credit cards for sure. Spending money lavishly? Finding manage money? Why don’t you try Credit Karma? This website would provide credit scores, transaction notification, finding unclaimed money, personal advice and much more.

What actually is Credit Karma?

Note: While you look for Credit Karma make sure to enter ‘C’ and ‘K’. There are a lot of spams with the similar names such as CreditCarma, KreditKarma etc. Do not enter your details over there. There are other popular various platforms to check where are your stands. Among such various websites, Credit Karma is one such.

Credit Karma is a platform which helps you to know your credit score, VantageScore 3.0, Tax preparation, TransUnion Score, Equifax score, credit report, credit monitoring and much more for free. This helps you to maintain and manage a better CIBL which would be helpful for you to get loans anytime. While there are other platforms such as freecreditreport.com which says it to be free but would charge a monthly subscription charge.

While some of the credit platforms charge a minimum amount of at least $10 a month, Credit Karma provides you all these facilities with demographics and visual statistics for free of cost. If you compare Credit Karma to FICO scores even then there is not much difference. Credit Karma is secured with 128-bit encryption and the personal details are privacy protected.

Is Credit Karma 100% Free?

Yes, Credit Karma provides various services such as credit score, statistics, and demographics at free of cost. There are other such credit score teller platforms which have hidden charges and later sell the user’s personal information for marketing and advertising companies. But still, Credit Karma does not sell the user’s personal or credit details to any 3rd party company. Now you might be wondering how is it beneficial to them? They are beneficial through the Ad’s that pop up while you open Credit Karma website.

There are complaints too stating there are way lot more ads on the website and app. Credit Karma is full-time free service. While some platforms promote themselves as free then start deducting charges and state that the service was free just for 1 month. You can sign up and make use of Credit Karma without worries.

Is Credit Karma Safe?

You would be requested to enter the SSN while the sign-up process on Credit Karma in order to look for your CIBL score. Credit Karma claims that the data you share with them is safe and secured. Privacy protection is very important but in the case of Credit Karma, it just verifies the SSN number and does not store it. When the data gets stored on a server hackers can get the information by hacking a particular site while Credit Karma just verifies hence less chance of getting hacked.

Credit Karma website is a ‘https://‘ secured which are encrypted for sure. This 128-bit encryption is very safe and reliable as they also have been certified by DigiCert and Better Business Bureau. In the case of the Credit Karma mobile application, it is Pin protected so that no one gets access to your account from your mobile. Apart from that this platform is not a live transaction executable space hence it is safer with fewer risks. And the Credit karma does not sell the credit card information to any 3rd party sources for their marketing. The same thing applies to the contact details of individuals. Hence Credit Karma is trust worthy and can be used.

Why should I use Credit Karma?

You would be going through a lot of expenses throughout the month. In a year you may invest on Television, Car, Property, School Fees, Mobile Phones etc. During these purchases, you may also take loans or purchase things on EMI. If you can manage the transactions, monthly expenses, and EMI’s then you can make some savings. Else you would be in trouble and would be liable to the credit card company. This would result in a bad credit score which would affect in the future when you look for loans.

By signing up to this site it would provide you the CIBL score. It would be ranging from 300 to 900. The better the score better the better you are at money management. And if you are planning to take loans then your credit score would be taken into consideration and loan would be sanctioned. With a bad credit score, it would be hard to get a loan.

Benefits of using Credit Karma

Once you sign up with Credit Karma the would break down your credit information and make an analysis of the data. This would be helpful in gauging the areas you need more put more attention. And the appealing feature of Credit Karma is they provide free credit scores and many other services. This would help you to manage the transactions and scale up your credit score every month. Apart from this, you get even more from Credit Karma such as.

• To check your Vantage Score 3.0
• Access to Auto insurance score, Home Insurance Score.
• Check where you stand in a statistical way in case of All Accounts, Auto Loans, Credit Cards and other accounts.
• Equifax credit and TransUnion credit score.
• Credit monitoring and updates then and there.
• Check your credit score any number of times without paying a single penny.
• Credit card report to improve in weak areas and increase your CIBL score.
• There is a credit score simulator which would show the potential rise and lows of your credit score depending on the certain actions. This would help you to take measures not to make such mistakes.
• You would develop money management skills, manage your account of expenses, investment, purchases.
• Learn to make financial decisions such as taking loans. Choosing Credit cards depending on the usage and requirements.
• Easy analysis and statistical representation on your dashboard. Break down scores on each weighted category. You can also learn how the scoring happens and monitor your expenses.

In some cases, even after having a good CIBL score you would get a ‘Fair’ rating. You can check the bills payments, and transactions to know the reason behind the rating. From this, you get to know the best potential for personal growth. Under categories, you have more details, demographics of the whole month. Here you can compare scores of your own personal records.

Features of Credit Karma

Credit Card Utilization

It shows the usage of your credit card throughout the month. And the figures with up and down arrows show your performance and expenditure. You can learn to improvise with these scores.

Payment History

This shows how efficiently you pay your bills on time and shows how reliable are you in meeting your billing obligations. This also can help you to restrict your unnecessary expenditures which may fail at payment history later.

Derogation Marks

Whether you had accounts in collection, bankruptcies, civil judgments and other credit reports. Any of this would have a high impact on your credit score.

Age of Credit History

From how long you are having a credit account. The number of accounts and their average age spans. This has a medium impact as this can be used to measure the consistency of other scores.

Total Accounts

The total number of accounts which have been listed on your credit reports. This has a low impact on the number of accounts does not matter if the credit score is up to mark.

Credit Inquiries

This represents the number of hard inquiries made on your credit over a period of time. Generally taken into consideration of 2 years. This also has a low impact on the credit score.

TransUnion Credit Score

This is more like live scoring and would change as and when you make changes. This is helpful even to know whether you can take loans depending on the scores. A score less than 550 is considered as a bad score.

Equifax Credit Score

Apart from TransUnion Score you get to know the Equifax score given by 2 out of 3 credit bureaus and even this is free of cost. In both the case they use the VantageScore 3.0 model.

TransUnion Credit Report

This can be checked every week from the dashboard by clicking on the ‘view score details‘. This gives a better consistent access to credit throughout the year. Now with this, you can monitor your credit reports and check for errors or discrepancies.

Free Tax Filing

Credit Karma is now providing tax filing and it is for free. Credit Tax Filing is called as Credit Kama Tax and is a great success with nearly 1 million users filing their tax in the first year.

Is Credit Karma accurate enough?

Without accurate scoring, it wouldn’t be helpful as your whole money management and investment may go in vain. Credit Karma gets their score from 2-3 credit bureaus but not the exact FICO scores. This the method used by most of the credit score providers. They make an analysis of the score from the expenses and transactions from the bank history. When compared to other card score website Credit is reliable and accurate.

The accuracy level depends as Credit Karma refers with other bureaus. When we compare the VantageScore 3.0 it is credited by three credit bureaus. So when you apply for a loan the FICO may be entirely different to that of Credit Karma’s score. It changes from the FICO score as this is referred from other bureaus while FICO has a different method of calculating scores. But you won’t get to know the difference between Credit Karma and FICO scores it can be with a marginal difference or can be at extreme ends also. According to some users, Credit Karma’s score is way less when compared to FICO while some members say the difference is in a different direction.

While in some cases the Credit Karma score was more than the FICO which made the users disappointed as they weren’t qualifying for the competitive rates. But most of them claim to have a negligible difference between FICO and Credit Karma. On an average, the Credit Karma is recommended as it has a fair credit score and is a free service. As there are various views the personal experience matters to decide whether to rely on Credit Karma or not.

Will my Credit Score get affected by Credit Karma?

This one of the frequently asked question regarding the actual credit score getting affected by using Credit Karma. Credit Karma is just a platform where it helps you to make financial decisions. It does not affect your credit score. It gives you better suggestions to improve by managing your expenditure, loans etc. If you already have a good credit score or managed to then Credit karma would calculate more loans options for you.

Is Credit Karma a Scam?

This is one of the frequently raised questions as Credit Karma provided credit scores and reports free of cost and there are quite a few bad customer reviews too. No, Credit Karma is not a scam. It is a genuine website which assists you in financial management and improving your credit score. They are a legit company with legit business model and is into the industry from past 7 years.

Just imagine after getting certified from DigiCert and BBB ( Better Business Bureau) how can they be a scam. They are providing service for free but are legit. Currently, Credit Karma is growing enormously with a huge user base of around 60 million members. They are also getting huge funding from various investors in millions. A $175 million additional funding was from investor made a total of $368.5 million. This is the confidence investor have kept on Credit Karma. You can look into the details and make a research from your side before signing into this. But from our side, we confirm you that this is not a scam and is trustworthy.

Are there any complaints on Credit Karma?

With such a huge company there are chances that very few users might have had a bad experience. But there are 390 cases on Credit Karma as of now hence Better Business Bureau (BBB) has rated B- for Credit Karma. When they total members are taken into count 390 cases are like 0.00065% people had a problem with Credit Karma. And as per latest updates, it is heard that all these complaints have been resolved by Credit Karma. Credit Karma had also received an action from FTC in 2014 for security risks in the mobile application through which they were providing. But currently, all such issues have been solved and with the encryptions, it is safe and reliable.

If you are referring to the offers on Credit Karma then they might not be 100% accurate. The particular credit cards which are mentioned there are from the advertisement and marketing. Instead, you can refer sites such as creditcards.com or bankrate.com instead of Credit Karma.

How to make an Account with Credit Karma

You can use a mobile app as well as the online website in order to sign up with Credit Karma. Open the Credit Karma official Site and look for Sign Up for Free on the top right corner of the site. On the Sign Up page, you need to enter your email and create a password.

In the second step, you need to provide details such as Name, Address, Date of Birth and Last 4 digits of Social Security Number.

In the last step, you need to confirm your Identity for which Credit Karma may as you certain set of questions. Or to verify with an other certified credential.

Credit Karma Login

• Once you have an account with Credit Karma you may now login to check your credit scores.
• Enter the Email ID and Password which you used while registering.
• If you haven’t registered then select the Sign Up for Free option and create an account.
• Select the Get Help Accessing your Account option if you have problems logging such as forgot the password, forgot email or any other errors.You can reset your password if you have forgotten.
• And if you are using Credit Karma from your personal laptop/PC then tick the checkmark next to Remember My Email Next Time which would remember the next you log in.

Our Final Word

Using a platform which would help you to track all your financial decisions and expenditures is helpful. This would help you maintain and reach better credit score which would be helpful for you to get loans in future. The next time you are looking for a loan you would get it quicker as the lender would give it depending on your credit score.

If you are still unsure about the Credit Karma’s scores then you can check it while taking a loan or compare with the FICO scores. Even when someone refers to FICO scores would consider the VantageScore 3.0 from Credit Karma. As the service is free of cost and there are a lot of demographics this would be definitely of help to you in money management.

While other platforms such as Equifax, TransUnion and Experian charges around $15 a month this is a win-win condition. You get the benefits of maintaining the credit scores, filing taxes while Credit Karma would be even more popular with a bigger user base. The real-time scoring is genuine and has a negligible difference with the FICO. We would be recommending you Credit Karma if you are looking for something reliable and free to monitor the credit scores. But none of the credit scores can be relied on solely, not even Credit Karma. But getting more information for free is better than knowing nothing.