FreeCreditReport.com's ads must come clean

For those who have had enough of the FreeCreditReport.com singing pirate, the ship is sinking for the site's misleading advertisements.

As of September, owner Experian will have to spill the beans that their side business is only free if consumers enroll in a $14.95-a-month credit-monitoring service and then cancel it within a week.

The site's ubiquitous TV ads, in case you haven't seen them, feature slackers singing in their shabby apartments or waiting tables in pirate costumes. If only they had used FreeCreditReport.com, they wouldn't be in such a financial mess.

The controversy is that FreeCreditReport.com diverts customers away from the free government mandated site located at www.AnnualCreditReport.com.

It also has a Web site name that implies the report is free. Contrary to its misleading URL, FreeCreditReport.com charges a credit-monitoring service that costs $14.95 a month, automatically taken from consumers' credit cards.

Experian, the company that owns FreeCreditReport.com, has until September of this year to clean up the ads for its site, while other credit card companies had from May 2009 to February 22, 2010. The credit report company has already paid $1.25 million to settle charges for misleading consumers who ended up having to pay a monthly subscription fee.

Due to the legal issues, it now has a disclosure on its home page saying it's not affiliated with the annual free credit report program. This disclosure is in fine print on the side of the home page, on a subdued background.

Click here for details.