Checking your creditworthiness (credit check)
Do you want to take out a loan or mortgage, buy something in instalments or take out a mobile phone or energy contract? The company you want to do this with may first check your creditworthiness. This means it checks whether you are able to pay your bills. This is also called a credit check or credit scoring.
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Why a credit check?
Some companies provide products and services on credit. This means customers pay their bills afterwards. Examples of these types of companies are banks, mail order companies and telecommunication providers. These companies want to minimise the risk of customers not paying their bills. That is why they often perform a credit check first.
Credit check result
If a company performs a credit check on you, this may reveal, for example, that you have payment arrears with another company. In that case, the company may refuse you as a customer, or ask for an advance.
Data for credit check
Companies perform a credit check with data about people collected by the Credit Registration Office (Dutch: BKR) or business information agencies. By law, banks are obliged to participate in credit registration with the Credit Registration Office. But other companies that provide credit are also affiliated with the Credit Registration Office, such as mail order companies and telecommunication providers.
Registration with the Credit Registration Office
You will be registered with the Credit Registration Office as soon as you have received a loan from a company affiliated with the Credit Registration Office. A credit is, for example, a loan, credit card or customer card with the option to be overdrawn. But a mobile phone that you pay off every month under your contract is also a credit. If it concerns a mobile phone of more than 250 euros, you will be registered with the Credit Registration Office.
If you want credit from a company that is affiliated with the Credit Registration Office, this company will request your details from the Credit Registration Office. If the company decides to grant you credit, the company will report this to the Credit Registration Office. The Credit Registration Office then registers your credit. If you have payment arrears, the company must report this to the Credit Registration Office.
Viewing and changing Credit Registration Office registration
- If you want to know how you are registered with the Credit Registration Office, you can visit their website to check your credit statement(in Dutch).
- If you have requested your data from the Credit Registration Office, and you believe they are incorrect, you can ask the company that registered you with the Credit Registration Office to modify your data. For example, the bank where you have a loan. For more information see: Changing my registration on the website of the Credit Registration Office (in Dutch).
Retention period Credit Registration Office registration
Your registration with the Credit Registration Office remains in force for as long as your credit runs. If your credit has been terminated, the retention period starts. Your data will then remain visible for another 5 years. Along with your data, it states that the credit has expired and when it stopped. Your data will automatically disappear from the central register once the 5-year retention period has expired.
Business information agencies
Business information agencies collect data about companies and individuals. But they are not allowed to simply collect and pass on all kinds of data about you. They can only do so if they comply with the privacy law.
Business information agencies use, among other things, public sources and general statistical data about your living environment.
But they are not allowed to retrieve your data from everywhere. For example, your employer or benefits agency may not transfer data about your salary or benefits to a business information agency without your consent.
Business information agencies are allowed to ask for your current address in order to contact you. For example, with your neighbours. But your neighbours are not obliged to answer. Inquiries are not allowed. A business information agency is not allowed to ask your neighbours or others about, for example, your income, your employer, how often you go on holiday or the car you drive.