On February 23, 2010, the Federal Trade Commission released its final rule on Free Credit Report offers as required under the Credit Card Accountability and Disclosure Act (CARD Act).
The Federal Trade Commission's Free Credit Reports Rule will require new prominent disclosures in all online advertisements for "free credit reports." Any site marketing free credit reports will be required to include a disclosure across the top of each page stating:
THIS NOTICE IS REQUIRED BY LAW. Read more at FTC.GOV.
You have the right to a free credit report from AnnualCreditReport.com
or 877-322-8228, the ONLY authorized source under federal law.
The disclosures must also include a clickable button to "Take me to the authorized source" and clickable links to AnnualCreditReport.com and FTC.GOV.
Based on the new ruling, all free credit report offers advertised online have until April 1, 2010 to comply. In the meantime, sites advertising "free credit reports" are required to include a disclosure that simply states:
“Free credits reports are available under Federal law at: AnnualCreditReport.com.”
There's really not much difference other than a few lines of text and a button, right? Wrong. The FTC is very specific about the placement and prominence of the disclosure. The following examples provided by the FTC show exactly what is expected of sites that choose to market "free credit report" offers:
(click images to enlarge)
While online free credit report offers have until April 1 to comply with the new disclosure requirements, TV and radio advertisements have until September 1 to make their changes. To read the full details on the FTC's Final Rule, download the final rule here.
Deanna Templeton is the Director of Consumer Education for Credit.com and has more than 10 years of experience in the online credit and personal finance markets and works closely with the affiliate marketing side of the business.
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