FreeCreditScore.com, FreeCreditReport.com and Credit.com are websites owned by Experian Consumer Direct, a subsidiary of the credit bureau

Experian Experian plc is a multinational corporation, multinational data broker and consumer credit reporting company headquartered in Dublin, Ireland. Experian collects and aggregates information on more than 1 billion people and businesses including ...

. The sites offer users their personal

credit reports A credit history is a record of a borrower's responsible repayment of debts. A credit report is a record of the borrower's credit history from a number of sources, including banks, credit card companies, collection agencies, and governments. A bo ...

from Experian on the condition that they sign up for Experian's Triple Advantage

credit monitoring Credit report monitoring or company tracking is the monitoring of one's credit history in order to detect any suspicious activity or changes. Companies offer such service on a subscription basis, typically granting regular access to one's credit h ...

program for a fee. The credit report also comes with the user's PLUS

credit score A credit score is a numerical expression based on a level analysis of a person's credit files, to represent the creditworthiness of an individual. A credit score is primarily based on a credit report, information typically sourced from credit bu ...

. The membership may be canceled with no charge within 7 days of signup by contacting the call center.

Controversy

FreeCreditReport.com as well as its affiliate site FreeCreditScore.com has been the subject of two major lawsuits. In 2005, the site's owner, Experian Consumer Direct, was sued by the

Federal Trade Commission The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is an independent agency of the United States government whose principal mission is the enforcement of civil (non-criminal) United States antitrust law, antitrust law and the promotion of consumer protection. It ...

for deceptive marketing tactics. They settled for $950,000 in the form of free credit monitoring for those affected and agreed not to use deceptive and misleading claims about free offers and to offer full disclosure of terms and conditions of any free offers. The penalty was largely seen as ineffective since it amounted to a small fraction of the $72 million annual advertising budget for FreeCreditReport.com. They were further subjected to a 2006 inquiry by the

Florida Florida ( ; ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders the Gulf of Mexico to the west, Alabama to the northwest, Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia to the north, the Atlantic ...

Attorney General In most common law jurisdictions, the attorney general (: attorneys general) or attorney-general (AG or Atty.-Gen) is the main legal advisor to the government. In some jurisdictions, attorneys general also have executive responsibility for law enf ...

for violating

's Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act. An

MSNBC.com MSNBC is an American cable news channel owned by the NBCUniversal News Group division of NBCUniversal, a subsidiary of Comcast. Launched on July 15, 1996, and headquartered at 30 Rockefeller Plaza in Manhattan, the channel primarily broadcasts ...

investigation of the website called it "misleading", "deceptive" and a "scam". The program has also been identified as a

scam A scam, or a confidence trick, is an attempt to defraud a person or group after first gaining their Trust (emotion), trust. Confidence tricks exploit victims using a combination of the victim's credulity, naivety, compassion, vanity, confidence ...

by ConsumerFraudReporting.org. The advertising practices of FreeCreditReport.com were specifically addressed in the

Credit CARD Act of 2009 The Credit Card Accountability Responsibility and Disclosure (CARD) Act of 2009 is a U.S. federal law, federal statute passed by the United States Congress and signed by President of the United States, U.S. President Barack Obama on May 22, 200 ...

. Now any company who advertises a “free credit report” on TV or radio must include the statement: "This is not the free credit report provided for by Federal law." The law also calls for the Federal Trade Commission to issue new rules that will force free credit report advertisers to inform consumers that the only place for a free credit report is AnnualCreditReport.com.

Advertising

Singing ad campaign

In October 2007, Experian Consumer Direct began airing an

advertising Advertising is the practice and techniques employed to bring attention to a Product (business), product or Service (economics), service. Advertising aims to present a product or service in terms of utility, advantages, and qualities of int ...

campaign featuring singer Eric Violette as a man struggling with difficult life circumstances due to his poor credit score, and his ignorance of it. The commercials feature jingles written using various distinctive forms of popular music. To date the company has aired nine different commercials, which have aired in different orders in different markets. The commercials featuring Violette and his band stopped airing in February 2010, as a new band was brought in. In June 2012, the original band returned in new commercials for FreeCreditScore.com as a part of a "comeback" campaign. The themes/motifs of the commercials include, in order: * Pirate-themed seafood restaurant * Living with in-laws * Used car * Bicycle riding * Rockstars pool party * Renaissance fair * Roller coaster * Small town / cell phone shop * Country bar in Reno Most feature references to the original "Pirate" commercial; either lyrically, or by including it as part of the background. Most also feature an elderly woman, who in the later commercials is disapproving of the group. Violette was born June 12, 1981, in

Montreal Montreal is the List of towns in Quebec, largest city in the Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Quebec, the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, second-largest in Canada, and the List of North American cit ...

and attended the

National Theatre School of Canada The National Theatre School of Canada (NTS, ) is a private institution of professional theatre studies in Montreal, Quebec. Established in 1960, the NTS receives its principal funding from grants awarded by the Government of Canada and cultural ...

in 2002. The commercials prepared by David Muhlenfeld at

The Martin Agency The Martin Agency is one of the top American creative advertising agencies. A holding of the Interpublic Group of Companies, Martin is long-known for helping brands "impact culture" in the United States and internationally. The company's chief ...

began appearing in October 2007. Due to Violette's

Canadian French Canadian French (, ) is the French language as it is spoken in Canada. It includes multiple varieties, the most prominent of which is Québécois (Quebec French). Formerly ''Canadian French'' referred solely to Quebec French and the closely re ...

accent, his voice was dubbed by Muhlenfeld. He earlier did a

Sirius Satellite Radio Sirius Satellite Radio was a satellite radio ( SDARS) service that operated in the United States and Canada. Sirius launched in 2002, and primarily competed with XM Satellite Radio, until the two services merged in 2008 to form Sirius XM. Li ...

commercial in French. When asked about his character by the ''

Washington Post ''The Washington Post'', locally known as ''The'' ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'' or ''WP'', is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C., the national capital. It is the most widely circulated newspaper in the Washington m ...

'', Violette said that "He's a guy who has a lot of dreams and hopes. But he's not able to make them concrete because I think he's a little bit lazy. He's the kind of guy who always has bad luck . . . but I'm sure he has a good heart." The commercials have spawned various homages including many parodies on

YouTube YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...

. ''

MADtv ''Mad TV'' (stylized as ''MADtv'') is an American sketch comedy television series created by David Salzman, Fax Bahr, and Adam Small. Loosely based on the humor magazine '' Mad'', ''Mad TVs pre-taped satirical sketches were primarily parodie ...

'' parodied the ads in a sketch that featured a young man cursed by bad luck after getting a credit card in his senior year of high school. After racking up $80,000 in debt, he ends up in jail, escapes and eventually winds up living with a skinhead named Fang "in a soggy cardboard box". In response to the commercials, the

produced two public service announcements to remind citizens of the right to annual free credit reports from annualcreditreport.com.

Freecreditscore band campaign

In May 2010 a nationwide band search began to find the new face of freecreditscore.com. Live auditions were held in New York, Chicago and Los Angeles. Bands could also submit videos of themselves online at freecreditscoreband.com for consideration. Many were typical entries, but some bands, apparently as a joke, submitted videos as well, most notably

Comparative Anatomy Comparative anatomy is the study of similarities and differences in the anatomy of different species. It is closely related to evolutionary biology and phylogeny (the evolution of species). The science began in the classical era, continuing in t ...

. In August 2010

The American Secrets ''The'' is a grammatical article in English, denoting nouns that are already or about to be mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' ...

(Formerly known as "Victorious Secrets", but changed the name to avoid any possible legal issues with

Victoria's Secret Victoria's Secret is an American lingerie, clothing and beauty products, beauty retailer. Founded in 1977 by a Stanford graduate student and his wife, Roy Raymond, Roy and Gaye Raymond, the company's five lingerie stores were sold to Les Wexner i ...

) were named the new FCS Band. The band features Daniel Zott of

JR JR JR JR (pronounced "junior junior"; originally named Dale Earnhardt Jr. Jr.) is an American indie-pop band from Detroit, Michigan, founded by Daniel Zott and Joshua Epstein. The band also includes drummer Mike Higgins. History Zott and Epstein ...

. Unlike the first band, who sang about finding themselves in bad credit situations, the new band sang instead about other people in bad credit situations, while simply being part of the background.

Original band returns

On June 15, 2012, freecreditscore.com released a new commercial that featured the return of the original band. FCS Commercial Themes: * "New Spot"- featuring the band gone and regrouping, with all members now financially well off. The "used sub-compact" from the used car commercial, is now pimped out, and the scene from the earlier commercial is reprised. The band is stopped at a light next to attractive women in a red Mustang convertible, but this time, instead of laughing at them as in the previous commercial, the women are now interested because of their financial success. * "Set It Off"- featuring the band talking about receiving score alerts from the FCS app. The commercial also featured the return of the elderly lady, who frequented the band's older commercials.

References

{{reflist, 2

External links

AnnualCreditReport.com
the legally mandated, FTC-promoted site.
FreeCreditScore.comFreeCreditReport.com
Finance websites Credit scoring