How do you unfreeze your credit?
You unfreeze by contacting each nationwide credit reporting company that placed the freeze, using its online account, phone line, or mail. You must supply identifying information. Under the Fair Credit Reporting Act, companies must lift an online or phone freeze within one hour and a mailed request within three business days.
A credit freeze, also called a security freeze, restricts access to your credit report at each nationwide credit reporting company. Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion are the three largest. A freeze is not a single national setting; it is a file-level restriction held separately by each company, so unfreezing requires a request to every company where a freeze is in place. A freeze also differs from a fraud alert, which asks lenders to take extra steps to verify identity, and from a credit lock, which is a product a company offers rather than a right defined in federal law.
Unfreezing, sometimes called thawing or lifting a freeze, is the same process in reverse. Each company accepts requests through a secure online account, an automated telephone line, or mail. The request must identify you: typically your full name, current and prior addresses, date of birth, Social Security number, and sometimes a government-issued identification or a utility bill. When the freeze was placed, the company issued a personal identification number or password; many companies now rely on online account credentials instead. A thaw can be permanent, or temporary, meaning you set a start date and an end date so access reopens only for a defined window.
The Fair Credit Reporting Act, as amended by the Economic Growth, Regulatory Relief, and Consumer Protection Act, sets the timing. A company must lift a freeze no later than one hour after receiving a request made by telephone or secure electronic means, and no later than three business days after receiving a request by mail. The same law made placing and lifting a freeze free nationwide. If you cannot locate your PIN or password, the company may require a mailed request with copies of identifying documents, which follows the three-business-day timeline.
Unfreezing does not change what is in your credit report. It restores the ability of lenders and other users with a permissible purpose to obtain your report so they can process an application, such as a mortgage, auto loan, rental screening, utility account, insurance policy, or employment background check. Lifting a freeze at one company does not lift it at the others, so an application that may be reviewed by more than one company typically requires a thaw at all three. Keep the confirmation each company sends, because it documents the date and scope of the request.