Lesson 2 of 3 · 5 min
Your report is free — go and read it
RBI makes every bureau hand you one full report a year at no cost — four in all — and the accounts grid inside says far more than the score does.
RBI requires every credit bureau to give you one full credit report, score included, free of charge every calendar year. Four bureaus means four free reports — enough to look yourself up every quarter without paying anyone.
The report behind the score is the part worth reading: every account, every limit, and a month-by-month grid of how late, if ever, each payment ran.
The numbers that matter
- Score range used by the bureaus
- 300 to 900
- Free full reports a year
- 4 — one from each bureau
- Days the bureau and lender have to resolve a dispute
- 30
- Compensation if your complaint drags past 30 days
- ₹100 per day
An RBI rule from 2023 — delay now costs the bureau or lender money.
The actual document
What the bureau holds on you, and what a lender reads first
Sample Credit Information Bureau
Credit Information Report · 31 August 2026
- Name
- S. Iyer
- PAN
- ABCDE1234F
- Report date
- 31 August 2026
Summary
- Score762
- Total accounts6
- Amount currently overdue₹0
- Enquiries in the last 6 months4
Your accounts, as the bureau holds them
- Credit card · Kaveri BankActive · ₹42,000 of ₹1,50,000
- Personal loan · Sahyadri FinanceClosed · paid in full
- Consumer durable loan · MeridianSettled
- Two-wheeler loan · Kaveri BankActive · 2 late in 36 months
A fictional report. Every bureau owes you one free full report a calendar year — four bureaus, so four looks, and a dispute has to be resolved in 30 days.
Tap a numbered marker to see what that line means.
- 1
Score. On a 300–900 scale. The score is a summary of everything below it, not a separate fact — fix what is below and the number follows, which is why the report matters more than the score.
- 2
Enquiries in the last 6 months. Each application for credit leaves a hard enquiry here. Four in six months reads as someone shopping hard for money — checking your OWN report leaves no mark at all.
- 3
Credit card · Kaveri Bank. Utilisation: 28% of the limit in use. The balance is reported on the statement date, so paying the full bill a day late can still report a high number on an account you never actually revolved.
- 4
Personal loan · Sahyadri Finance. The healthy ending, and worth keeping on the report. A closed, fully-repaid loan is evidence — asking a bureau to delete an old good account removes proof you repay.
- 5
Consumer durable loan · Meridian. The word that costs the most. "Settled" means the lender accepted less than the full amount — it is not the same as closed, it lingers for years, and one of these outweighs several clean accounts.
- 6
Two-wheeler loan · Kaveri Bank. The payment grid, month by month, going back three years. This is the part almost nobody reads, and it is the part a lender reads first.
Put these in order
Put the free-report routine in the order it happens.
- File a free dispute online for anything that looks wrong
- Read the accounts grid and the enquiries section closely
- Confirm your identity with PAN and an OTP
- Find its free annual credit report page
- Pick one of the four bureaus
| Status | What it means | How lenders read it |
|---|---|---|
| Closed | Repaid in full and shut properly | The healthy ending — this is what builds a score |
| Settled | The lender accepted less than the full amount and stopped chasing the rest | A lasting stain — it says the full debt was not repaid, and it lingers on the report for years |
| Written-off | The lender gave up on collecting | The heaviest mark of the three — expect refusals until it is resolved |
Match them up
Five words your report uses
Drag each meaning up or down until it sits beside the term it belongs to.
I paid it off. Why does the report still look bad?
KabirTara
Kabirasking
The lender offered to close the account if I paid part of what was owed. I paid, they stopped calling, it was over. Why is my report still holding it against me?
Taraexplaining
Because the report is not recording that you finished. It is recording how you finished. 'Settled' means the lender took less than it was owed and gave up on the rest.
Kabirasking
But they agreed to it. They suggested it.
Taraexplaining
They did, and for them it was a fair trade — some money beats none. It is still a smaller repayment than the contract asked for, and that is the fact the next lender reads.
Kabirasking
So one word on a page outweighs the money I actually handed over?
Taraexplaining
The word is the summary of the money. Pay the remaining amount in full later and you can ask the lender to re-report the account as closed — the bureau shows what the lender sends it, nothing more.
Quick check
The accounts grid on a report shows '000, 000, 030, 060' for the last four months. What is it saying?
Check yourself
1 / 3
Kabir asks
How many full credit reports are you owed free each year, and by whom?
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