Understanding Your Credit Check

When you run the check, if a credit file is found matching the applicant's name and address you will receive a credit score, the relevant rating band and summary reasons for the score plus a detailed credit report showing any active or satisfied judgements, bankruptcies and insolvencies and any notices of corrections or disputes on file.  The report will also include address confirmations and an address history of up to 5 linked addresses. 

Understanding the Score

The TransUnion Gauge 2 scoring model takes into account all the information provided within the TransUnion credit report and is an aggregated score against the whole of the UK. It is divided into 10 bandings, each representing a cross-sectional 10% of the population. In general terms, the higher the score, the lower the risk, so Band 1 is the highest risk, Band 10 the lowest, but each organisation using this model can set their own pass/accept ‘Mark’ based on their own criteria.

The score will be colour coded inline with the bands in the table above, although this can be customised if you would prefer to apply your own bands or RAG status.

Important: Applicants with no credit history such as benefit claimants, young applicants or people who prefer not to use credit may have low credit scores. It is therefore important to also use referencing and guarantors as part of your selection procedure. 

Match Types

If the submitted name and address matches a credit file at TransUnion then the check will return a result immediately and the credit report will show an 'Individual Match'.  

If the name and address do not result in a match then no score or report will be returned and it will show as no match, with an additional indication if relevant of whether the address has been found but the input name has not been found at that address (House match) or whether others with the same Surname exist at the address but not the individual in question (Surname match).  

Data Protection

The following is very important and must be adhered to:

• Applicants must provide consent before a credit check can be carried out on them.  As part of this they must also be shown the TransUnion Privacy Notice, available here: https://www.transunion.co.uk/legal/privacy-centre 
• You can only use the results to help assess whether someone is suitable to rent your property — not for any other purpose - and you should not rely on the results as the sole basis for a decision. 
• You must keep the results confidential and secure, and cannot share them with any other party, including both the tenant and landlord. 
• You must be registered with the ICO for data protection purposes.

Data Sources

TransUnion utilises many different datasets, including key public data to predict the likelihood of a person falling into arrears:

• Electoral Roll (Full/Edited)
• Address, Alias & Associate Links
• Postcode Address File (Royal Mail)
• Court Records - CCJ & Insolvencies (Registry Trust Ltd)

What happens if an applicant disputes the information in the credit check?

Applicants have a statutory right to see all the details that a rating agency hold about them.

The statutory report is available for free by the applicant contacting TransUnion. The report must be sent to the applicant by TransUnion within 2 weeks of receipt of request. They can request this via:

 https://www.transunionstatreport.co.uk/CreditReport/AboutYou