Hello Financial Coaches,
I hope you're enjoying the cool weather! We have some program updates to share with you as well as some great new resources that you can share with clients.
PROGRAM CHANGES
Income limit simplified! The income limit for both the Community Tax Center and Financial Coaching is now $50,000 a year, regardless of the number of people in the household.
New credit authorization form. Please note the new credit authorization form on our Volunteer Resource Page (in the credit section). Our contract with our credit report provider has changed and now we have to be a HUD Certified Credit Counseling Agency in order to pull credit reports without impacting the client's score. The new authorization form informs clients of the impact on their score and the alternative for getting their credit report, annualcreditreport.com. It is impossible to tell any one client how many points they will lose because of this inquiry, but for most people, it will be less than 5 points. You can read more about how inquiries affect credit scores on the MyFico web site.
NEW RESOURCES
Volunteer Resource Page updated! We added new resources and organized the Volunteer Resource Page. One new resource you will find is Assurance Wireless, the free cell phone service for people receiving public benefits.
Great budgeting tips.One of our volunteers shared this post on One Cobble at a Time. It's a simple, yet thorough way to think about budgeting, from creating to tracking. Maybe you will find some helpful tidbits to share with your clients. I will be emailing the link to all our clients as well.
I hope you find this information helpful. Thank you so much for all you do for our clients, our program and our community.
Sincerely,
Erika Leos
Financial Coaching Coordinator
I got a great question from one of our volunteers: "Does the report from annualcreditreport.com include credit scores? My understanding was that the data, but not the credit score, is included."
ReplyDeleteThe answer is no, the scores are not included on the report from annualcreditreport.com. If the client chooses to go with annualcreditreport.com, they will be responsible for purchasing the scores, if they want them.