Beware of identity theft – you might be the next victim!

Punit had applied for a car loan a month back and was waiting anxiously when he will finally drive his favorite SUV once the loan is approved. But to his utter dismay, he found that the bank has rejected his loan on the grounds of poor credit score. Wait a minute! Punit has always been a very sincere and responsible person who never lapses on repayment of previous loans neither he has any pending credit card bills. So being held up for a poor score is simply next to impossible. His nightmare begins when he starts getting warning calls from credit card companies for payment of bills he has never applied for. He desperately wishes that he is not the victim of identity theft. But unfortunately, he is.

But he is not the only one – hundreds of people are suffering from this malicious practice of identity theft that seems to be operating on a large scale across the country. And till now, no one has been able to curb it successfully. So it is only safe to be vigilant at your end. Keep your cards at a same place, be very careful while using your credit card especially for online shopping, and try not to lose it anywhere.

However, if you are already a victim of identity theft, you would know that someone is using all your personal information to obtain credit and when the imposter is not being able to pay his bills, you are being called upon to pay for something you have never purchased. Besides the tension that it has caused you, you will also find that your credit score has drastically gone down – the same score which took you on so many months to get better is now in the shambles. Now you are faced with such a situation that you cannot obtain credit for yourself also.

Though at this moment it is futile to ask you not to panic, but all is not lost yet. There are several ways to stop this from getting worst. As soon as you come to know that your identity has been stolen, the first thing you should do is obtain a police report affirming your stolen identity. Then notify the credit bureaus like CIBIL or Equifax. Request them to send you a copy of your credit report. Once you get the copy, search for all the fraudulent account that have been created in your name. Write to that credit bureau requesting them to block all the fraud accounts as soon as possible. After this is done, ask the bureau to inform those who have received a copy of your report about the erroneous information. And keep checking your credit report regularly from now on.

If your credit or debit card has been used by the thief, write a letter to the company or bank informing them about the fraud and request them to provide new account numbers. Also, change all the passwords and PINs and add new ones. Another important thing that you should do is to take action to have any criminal or civil judgments against you that may have resulted from your identity thief's action.

But it might also have happened that the thief had continued using all your credit and you had no chance of coming to know about it.

However, one thing you should keep in mind is that it is easy to write down the procedures that you should follow to avoid identity theft. But when it actually happens, things go haywire on ground and it is impossible to manage everything at one time. To help you out at such moment of utter crisis, there are agencies that are willing to assist you with their experience and expertise. Credit Sudhaar is one such company. Being India’s leading credit health improvement company, they have an excellent workforce who are specialized in dealing with such critical operations. They provide customized solutions dealing with each customer personally depending on their particular problem. Avail their services if you want to keep yourself out of trouble and secure your credit life in future.