Dear Dr. Don,
We have always paid our bills, but never on time. We recently realized that it hurts our credit score. How can we see what is in our credit report, and how long would it take to make a bad score good again?
-- Gilbert Gist

Dear Gilbert,
You can get a free copy of your credit report annually from each of the three principal consumer reporting agencies: Equifax, Experian and TransUnion. The Bankrate feature, "How to get your free credit report," shows you how to do it.

Personally, I like to stagger my requests over the year so I get a report from one of the three firms every four months. This approach helps to protect against identity theft without the expense of subscribing to a monitoring service.

In managing your credit, the goal is to always pay as agreed and to never be late with a payment. Late payments are part of your credit report for seven years, but it won't take seven years to improve your credit score.

Credit scores are based on the information in your credit report. You have to pay to see your credit scores from the three consumer reporting agencies, but Bankrate has partnered with myFICO to provide a free FICO score estimator.

Washington Mutual Card Services has a FICO score simulator that shows how actions that you take help/hurt your credit score -- including paying your bills on time over the next three, six or 12 months.

Now that you know, keep up with your payments and watch your credit improve by monitoring your credit reports.

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