Much of the discussion of credit bureaus focuses on the three most commonly used agencies: Equifax, Experian and TransUnion. However, there is another bureau you may need to know about. The company Innovis is actually one of many organizations that gathers, stores and publishes credit file information. While your Innovis report will contain much of the same account information as your other three, the report published by Innovis is used primarily for compiling and selling mailing lists to other businesses. For example, if a company wants to identify people in a certain zip code that they want to make a credit card offer to, that company may ask Innovis to compile a list that meets that profile.

How to get the report
Like with your other three credit reports, you are entitled to get a free copy of your Innovis report once a year. You can access your free report by visiting www.innovis.com or by calling 1-800-540-2505. If you find any errors in your Innovis report, you can dispute the incorrect information at the website.

How to opt out
If you wish to not have information from your Innovis report used in marketing lists, you can opt out at www.optoutprescreen.com. This precludes you from having information in any of your four major credit report files being used for marketing purposes for four years.

Should you worry?
There is some anecdotal evidence of certain lenders using Innovis reports in lending decisions. However, all available evidence suggests that these instances are rare. The best way to know which credit reports your lender uses is simply to ask. If they don’t use the Innovis report for lending decisions, your major concern is likely to be whether or not to opt out of being a part of marketing lists. That said, it’s not a bad idea to access your report and correct any of the mistakes within just in case you need to have a spotless Innovis report at some time down the road.