Substantial credit and reputation damage has been already done till it comes
to your knowledge. In order to prevent the loss, you must check whether your
identity is being used by someone to obtain credit as early as possible.
This is the best way to protect you from becoming a victim in the first
place.
In recent years, few companies have emerged to combat Identity Theft to help
protect their customers from identity thieves for a nominal annual fee. It
is cheaper and beneficial to subscribe to the services provided by these
identity theft prevention companies than to become identity theft victim. In
a survey report published by Javelin Strategy and Research and BBB, the
average cost per individual victim is more than $5,500. Identity theft
prevention companies charge far less than this figure for their services.
You are paid off for paying a monthly or annual fee for the service by these
companies by executing specific tasks and ensuring deployment of
special
prevention tools to help protect your information. Most of these companies
provide bundled service for prevention and recovery. Listed below are the
most common services offered by these companies to protect you from identity
theft:
Identity theft prevention service providing companies setup a baseline of your credit report and send it to you for approval. Thereafter, they start monitoring changes in your credit report with the baseline on monthly basis. Although the credit bureaus provide the same service; here you have the facility to get all three monitored instead of going to each bureau.
According to court decision only you can place fraud alert on your credit report. The identity theft prevention companies are not allowed to do so.
Commonly called credit freeze, is free for victims. You don't have to be a victim for credit freeze; but, you have to pay both to freeze and to thaw.
Identity theft prevention companies provide guarantee of repair services to their clients who become victim of identity theft. The companies help them to file documents with other concerned parties including credit bureaus, creditors etc.
Some prevention companies provide payment guarantee for the loss sustained by their customers who become victim of identity theft. You must read the agreement to check what is covered in the guarantee since they apply a limit to the recovered amount.
You must subscribe to service providers newsletters to receive latest
information on identity theft. You are informed of new tools and techniques
used by the thieves in attempting to steal your information. Keep abreast
with the latest identity theft trends, the better you are informed the more
knowledge and power you will get to prevent this crime.
Do your homework and prepare a questionnaire to gather all the information
about the company you want to work with. During information collection
process you must review each company's policies for addressing disputes.
This information can be found on their website's Terms and Conditions (or
Terms of Use) page. Don't hastily press the I Accept button to move on.
Since each company has its own procedure to handle disputes, you should read
each line thoroughly to know the policies of the company for dispute and
cancellation.
When you become a member, some companies may request you to provide copies
of your sensitive personal documents while others ask you to provide these
documents only if you are a victim of identity theft and have an opened
case. Check the following:
Make sure the company is trustworthy because you will be relying on it at the time of distress.
Does it have complete background checks?
What information it is acquiring from you?
What are its hiring practices?
Can you directly access people you talk to in the company?
Once you receive answers to your questions, go ahead with peace of mind and join the company.
Note: ID Watchdog provides free services for limited time. These include free copy of your Identity Profile Report, consultation with an identity theft specialist, database monitoring and 100% identity theft resolution guarantee.
