What's the differences between the 3 major credit bureaus?

[ViolaDreams]

All three of my credit reports are almost entirely identical, however my scores vary from report to report. Do the credit bureaus each use a different scoring model? It doesn't make any sense to me that there's no industry standard.

[Mangie]

The three credit bureaus compete for subscribers (creditors and collection agencies) and it is for this reason each one offers various improvements to their services.

Credit scores will be different for this reason, the individual bureau scores are derived from the data reported to it by its subscribers (creditor or collection agency). The variation in your score is caused by a subscriber only subscribing to one credit bureau and not all three.

Equifax, Transunion and Experian also have their own versions of the Fair Isaacs scoring formula. in fact, They have several versions of the formula. One version will foretell car loan defaults better than the other; one will foretell credit card defaults better than the other. This is why different creditors will subscribe to one and not the other.

Hence the difference you will notice in your credit scores when getting your credit pulled from a mortgage lender, car dealership, credit card companies and when you pull it on your own through the various websites that offer personal credit reports.