Why are banks providing credit scores for free?
I think the biggest reason is price; it's a lot cheaper now than it was to offer these.  That's because for the most part, when you get a credit score for free, you're not getting a true FICO score.  You're getting instead a VantageScore. VantageScore was created by the three credit bureaus, and as such they can offer it without paying Fair Isaac a licensing fee.  That makes it a lot cheaper to offer, and while it's not absolutely identical to FICO (or more accurately to any of the FICO provided scores) it's close enough for most peoples' purpose. And of course undoubtedly Fair Isaac has some price pressure on their side now that Vantage is big enough that many people see them as fungible.  As such they've had to make it easier, or they'd lose business - no longer being a monopolist. The other relevant piece here is that probably in many of these cases they're really just offering you what Experian would give you directly - so it's just a cross-marketing thing (where Experian, or perhaps another bureau, gets access to you as a customer so they can up-sell you ID theft insurance and whatnot, while the bank gets to offer the free score). "Why are banks all of a sudden providing people their credit scores for free? Because it is a really good idea.   On an ABC Bank website, it has:  ""Check your credit score for free"" button.  You click it.  Not only will it come up with a credit score, but it could also trigger a marketing workflow.  If it is direct mail, email, or a phone call a banker could contact you for help with a debt product.  This marketing could also be targeted, say a person with a high score could be targeted for a mortgage.  A person with a low or medium score could be targeted for ways and products to improve their score. Now if you run XYZ bank and not do the same, you are losing a competitive advantage to banks that offer this.  Not only will your customers be less happy, but you will lose a great marketing opportunities.   Face it, the only people that worry about their credit score are people that are in the market to borrow.  Which again, is more information.  If you have someone that never checks their credit score, or has their credit frozen, then it is wise not to market to them debt products." Two possible reasons: You can tell which scenario it is based on the credit history they provide you. If you look at the history and they show you your scores for each month, even though you didn't initiate it, then they are auto checking it each month. If the historical dates are only on the dates you clicked on the button, they are only checking when you manually click on it. As for the why they provide it, a few years back it was a desirable feature. Now they all do it just to keep pace with everyone else. Note that most banks only provide a single scoring model from one bureau (but different banks use different bureaus). "It's the inevitable result of the Fair, Isaac Company deciding to sell access to credit scores to the general public: some marketing dude at one of the banks thought, ""Wouldn't it be a great idea if we could use 'free' access to FICO scores as a differentiator for our CCs?"" And, because most humans play follow the leader, soon enough, other banks were paying FICO a license to present FICO scores to their card holders." "An alternative take on the ""why"" is that most people's credit is better than they think, and all of these banks offer credit products.  Put a ""good credit"" badge next to an ad for a shiny new card or auto refi, and it's just good business."
Some credit checks are ignored as part of the scoring process. Some companies will pull your info, to make sure you haven't become a risk. Others will inquire before they send you an offer. Since you didn't initiate the inquiry it can't impact your score. I visited annualcreditreport.com to get my annual credit report.  It is only the report, not the score or FICO score.  This is the only outlet I know of that allows you to get your report for free, without a bunch of strings attached or crap to sign up for and cancel later. It was very easy.  I was wary of putting in my private information, but how else can they possibly pull you up? Read the instructions carefully.  You go to each bureau to fetch your report, and they dutifully give you a free report, but they push hard to try and sell you a score or a report service.  It is easy to avoid these if you read carefully. Once you get a report,  you have print it out or you can't see it again for another year.  Each bureau has a different site, with different rules, and different identity checks to get in.  Again, read the instructions and it isn't hard. Instead of printing, I just saved the page as HTML.  You get one html file and a folder with all the images and other stuff.  This suits me but you might like to print. After you get each report, you have to click a link to back to the annualcreditreport.com site.  From there you go to the next bureau. Regarding a score.  Everybody does it differently.  Free Issac does FICO, but anybody who pulls your credit can generate a score however they like, so getting a score isn't anywhere near as important as making sure your report is accurate. You can use credit.com to simulate a score from one of the bureaus (I can't easily see which one at the moment).  It is as easy as annualcreditreport.com and I have no issue getting a simulated score and report card. "I would say a lot of the answers here aren't quite right. The main issue here is that banking is a highly oligopolous industry - there are few key players (the UK, for example, has only 5 major banks operating under a variety of brands: it's all the same companies underneath) and the market is very, very hard to enter owing to the immense regulatory burden. Because the landscape is so narrow and it's possible to keep close tabs on all  your competitors, there's no incentive to spend money on shiny new things to keep up with the competition - the industry is purely reactive.  If nobody else has an awesome, feature-filled online portal, there's no need for any one bank to make one.  If everybody is reactive, and nobody proactive, then it's a short logical deduction that improvements happen at a glacial pace. Also take into account that when you've got this toxic ""bare-minimum"" form of competition, the question for these people soon turns to ""what can we get away with?"" which results in things like subpar online portals with as much information as you like delivered on paper for a hefty charge, and extortionate, price fixed administrative fees.  Furthermore your transaction history is super valuable information.  There are one or two highly profitable companies who collate international transaction data and whose sole job in life is to restrict access to that information to the highest bidders.  Your transaction history is an asset in a multibillion dollar per year industry, and as such it is not surprising that banks don't want to give it out for free." "In the case of Wells Fargo, I believe that free trading is linked to your overall banking relationship with the firm. So if you have a checking account with a balance of $X, or  a total relationship with the bank (""relationship"" is usually defined as loan balances + deposit balances) over a certain amount, they give you a plum like free stock trades. The theory behind this approach is that banks want to be a one-stop shop for you. The idea is that they can market the banks products to you over a period of years (lowering customer acquisition cost) and offer you a level of convenience that allows them to charge a premium for services. For example, many people will pay a rate or fee premium on a mortgage or car loan so that they can do all of their business in one place. In other cases, free trading is linked to marketing campaigns by funds. Charles Schwab started this with the ""no transaction fee"" mutual fund store many years ago -- transaction fees are actually paid for by the mutual funds who pay for placement in the program. ""Free ETF trade"" programs are similar." I've had all my account with the same bank for all my life. Generally, the disadvantage is that if I want some kind of product like a credit extension or a mortgage, I have the one bank to go to and if they don't want to help me I'm out of luck. However, occasionally there are also perks like the bank spontaneously offering you increased credit or even a whole line of credit. They can do this because they have your whole history and trust you. &gt;That's one reason why they let you get access to your credit score, to check it the data is correct and make the 'product' (data about you) better.  If that were true, checking your credit report regularly would be straight forward and free. However, the credit agencies have turned insuring your credit report is actuate into a revenue stream. You can see raw data that goes into your score once a year, because the agencies are required by law to provide that you. In past the agencies have been criticized for trying to trick people into buying their services when they request their annual free report (see [freecreditreport.com vs annualcreditreport.com](http://www.getrichslowly.org/blog/2009/02/24/want-to-see-your-credit-report-for-free-freecreditreportcom-vs-annualcreditreportcom/)). If you want to check the accuracy of credit report more than once a year, you have to pay. If you want to know your score, you have to pay, although many credit cards offer this as a perk. Banks need to provide a free mechanism to deposit and withdrawal money.  Banks are free to charge fees as long as it is well published. If you are not happy with services you can complain to Banking ombudsman. You don't need a credit score. After I paid off my house mortgage many years ago I had this discussion with my mortgage agent (now bank VP). Your credit score is not a measure your ability to repay. It is a behavioral model and a statistical measure of the likelihood that the banks will make money off of you when they give you a loan, and a marketing tool that the banking industry uses to sell you long term and short term debt (mortgages and credit cards). Statistically speaking, people who close out major loans change their behaviors, and the model captures this change in behavior. In my own case, even though I have a credit history and sufficient cash is the bank to buy my next home outright, I have no credit score . What the model says is that people with my behavioral profile are not likely to take a loan, and if they did take one, they would pay it back so quickly that the bank would not even recoup the cost of initiating the loan. In short, people with my profile are bad news for the loans side of the bank. Thanks @quid for suggesting I capture this and post it as an answer &gt; If everyone on average gets say...a ~3% boost on their score, why wouldn't banks just adjust their standards by 3%?  Because the score change only affects those who have had delinquent payments (but are current now) on medical debt in the past 7 years.  That's not everybody... by a long shot.  Also, no lender (except possibly automated consumer debt applications) gives a shit about what your actual score is.  Mortgage lenders review each application based on things like debt:income, existing installment payments, and actual credit history (meaning account details and repayment history). I'm the contrarian in the crowd. I think credit scores and debt are the closest thing to evil incarnate. You're in good company. The absence of a credit score simply means the agencies have insufficient data in their behavioral model to determine how profitable your business would be to the bank. The higher your score, the more likely the bank is to make a profit from your loan.  IMHO, you're better off building up cash and investment reserves than a credit history. With sufficient reserves,  you will be able to shop around for a bank that will give you a good rate, if you ever do need a loan.  You'll be surprised at how quickly you get in a position where you don't need a loan if you save and invest wisely. I used to have a (high) credit score,  and I was miserable about it because there were always bills due. I gave up debt 14 years ago, paid the last debt 7 years ago, and have never. been happier. Raising kids without debt (or credit score) is much more fun than with debt. In this example you are providing 4x more collateral than you are borrowing.  Credit score shouldn't matter, regardless of how risky a borrower you are.  Sure it costs time and money to go to auction, but this can be factored into your interest rate / fees. I don't see how the bank can lose. Check with your bank.  As of January, 2015, the following banks and credit unions are offering free credit-scores: Announced, in the pipeline: Source: Banks to offer FICO credit scores for free Personal Experience: I've been receiving free FICO score from my credit union for more than 6 months now. Advice: Most people have multiple bank/credit-union accounts. The FICO score will be the same whoever offers it. If none of your financial institutions offer you a free credit-score then you may opt for free services like creditkarma.com or other paid services. None of them are the widely used FICO scores, but they can be a good gauge of your credit standing. Please note that a credit-score is number summarizing your credit-report and should not be confused.  In the news: The article states their reasons pretty clearly, and indicates that some people won't qualify under the new requirements that would have previously, they're not courting people with bad credit, they're just looking beyond credit score at other factors. They aren't opening floodgates for anyone with a pulse to get a car loan, just shifting things a bit to cast a slightly wider net. This is not new in the world of secured debt, the FHA has methodology for establishing a non-traditional credit report based on things like rental history, utility payments, auto-insurance payments, a person can't be declined an FHA loan for lack for lack of traditional credit history. I look beyond credit score as a landlord, a tenant with poor credit but a stellar rental history is more appealing than someone with great credit but a bad rental history. Vehicles and housing are very important to people, so they are likely to prioritize them above credit card payments or hospital bills. Time will tell, but it seems like a solid move in my view, they can refine their model over time and likely find a solid customer base among those who wouldn't qualify on credit score alone. "Different states have different laws, check your local laws concerning credit. Some states even guarantee you to get one free credit report per year. If you recently apply for an apartment, a mortgage or denied a credit card or loan, you can usually get a free copy from whomever you authorized to pull your credit report. Sign up credit monitoring service, there are quite a few of these. Most credit card companies offer such service, Amex, Chase, Citibank, etc. It' costs around $10-$20 per month. If you sign up a service and pull your own credit report, it's considered a ""soft"" pull which won't affect your score negatively." I get my credit scores from all three bureaus for free - no gimmick.  I use a combination of banks that offer this service to get my scores.  I wrote about this sometime back in my blog. For credit report, the only place to go is AnnualCreditReport.com.  I space it out so that I get one every 4 months since there is a once a year restriction per bureau.