 TITLE: What Is the Difference Between Credit-Based Insurance Scores and Credit Scores? CONTENT: How to Improve Your Credit Scores\n---------------------------------\nYou need to know what's on your credit reports before you can improve your credit scores. You can get your free credit report through Experian; in addition, through April 2021, you can get free copies of your credit reports every week from all three of the major credit reporting companies (Experian, TransUnion and Equifax) at AnnualCreditReport.com.\nTo improve your credit scores, pay attention to these factors:\n*   **Payment history**: Both FICO® and VantageScore credit scores are heavily influenced by the presence or lack of negative information on your credit reports. In fact, that category is worth about a third of the points in your scores. If you can avoid negative information, you're well on your way to great scores. The best way to do that is to make all your debt payments on time, every month.\n*   **Debt management**: Roughly one-third of the points in your scores are determined by debt-related metrics. This includes how much debt appears on your credit reports, how many accounts you have with balances, and your credit utilization, which measures your balances relative to credit card credit limits and original loan amounts. The less debt that appears on your credit reports, the better for your credit scores.\n*   **Inquiries**: An inquiry is a record of entities, usually lenders, accessing your credit reports. Inquiries can temporarily lower your credit scores by a few points. It's best to apply for credit sparingly to limit the number of inquiries. END