Yesterday I let you know that Chase would be launching a new free site called Credit Journey that would give users access to a free credit score, credit monitoring and other benefits. That site has now launched, so I thought I’d do review it like I have for other similar sites such as Credit Karma, Credit Sesame, Quizzle, Discover Score Card, Wise Piggy, Credit.com & Freecreditscore.com.
Contents
Free Credit Score
As mentioned, one of the benefits of the site is the fact that it gives you a free credit score. Your not required to input any credit card details, so there is no worry about being charged (this isn’t just a free trial). You don’t need to be a Chase cardholder either to sign up.
The score it provides is a VantageScore 3.0 and is powered by TransUnion. What’s interesting is that Chase typically doesn’t pull TransUnion data when they are making approval decisions on credit cards. It’s also unlikely that they use VantageScores as part of the lending decision as a FICO score is much more commonly used.
This means the score they are giving you is unlikely to be the same score they are looking at as part of their lending decision. The score itself updates weekly as long as you log in and checking the score does not impact your score in anyway.
Credit Tools
Credit Monitoring
You’l be alerted whenever a ‘critical’ change is made to your credit report, for example a delinquent or late payment or a hard pull on your credit report.
Credit Score Simulator
You can see how your score will be affected by doing certain things, e.g how your score will be effected if you pay off debt or open a new account.
Our Verdict
I didn’t have high hopes for Credit Journey, I really don’t think a VantageScore based on TransUnion data is remotely useful anymore especially when Credit Karma gives you the exact same information but also gives you data on your Equifax report and a lot of other features. The Discover Scorecard provides you with a free FICO score as well.
Do you see any point in signing up for Credit Journey? Let us know in the comments below.
Update: Readers point out two things:
- This tells you exactly how many accounts have been opened in the last two years, this could be useful for determining your Chase 5/24 status
- They might use this for determining Chase pre-approval data (they surely must be planning to market to users of the site).
