I posted in the sample letter request, but realised perhaps I should make a thread instead. My apologies if I should not have posted above. That being said... my Mom's been a widow for nearly 20 years now. Recently she's been receiving alarming phone calls of people looking for my deceased Father. Apparantly someone's using his name/address / phone number to sign up for random home based business and community college student loan stuff online. Over the past few months it's gotten worse and I finally convinced my Mom to change her phone number. She still lives at the same address that they were at when he died in 88. The other day she gets a call from a citicorp group affiliate. I'm in the process of drafting a letter for her to send to the agencies along with death cert to place a fraud altert on his SS# and CA reports. She has finally changed her phone number to an unlisted # as well. Are there any other steps I should take beyond sending certified - return receipt requested letters to each of the three agencies? Any advice or info would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.
I don't want to assume here, so excuse any suggestions that you may have done, or seem obvious: 1) Pull all of your mom's credit reports to look for fraudulent accounts. If she hasn't used them this year, go to www.annualreport.com for free credit reports. Study them and identify what may be fraudulent accounts. 2) Call the credit reporting agenices immediately with a fraud alert, the reps will walk her through this step. 3) If there are fraudulent accounts, notify the police, and file a complaint. You may need this as evidence later. 4) If your mother is getting any collection agency letters and/or notices, you will need to notify in writing that your father is deceased, and these are fraudulent accounts.
Hold it, bizwiz, it's not Mom who's getting all the attention, it's her deceased husband. To the OP, here's my two cents: To anyone wishing to get him to sign up for anything, here's what I would say: "I'm sorry, he no longer lives here. Try this address: (address of cemetery), unit (plot number). You can leave a message for him at (cemetery's phone number)." Why should she have to go through the expense of sending a CMRRR letter (or a bunch of them) when there is no possible way she can be responsible for anything here?
Because better safe than sorry....it is highly likely that HER credit reports still hold joint accounts, so her credit reports may show fraudulent accounts as well. (Take of first potential harms first). Secondly, if she happens to live in a community property state, she may be liable under the law (if claims of fraud not entered). In short, we do not know all the details, and prevention and "forearmed" with information is the most prudent course. Of course, pulling the deceased husband's credit reports is a must, to both examine for fraudulent accounts, and see if any may be joint. We also know that many CAs will research (w/husband's SS#), and find older joint accounts and go after the mother as well. Just trying to cover all the bases here, and reduce the stress level for the mother.
The Community ended when her husband died 20 years ago. The State may be a Community property state but she is not part of a Marital Community. Given that CRA's can only disclose consumer reports to consumers who are the subject of the report, I doubt she will be able to get a copy of her deceased spouse's report. She can certainly get her own and that is a good idea.
Again you are correct, but there always seems to be a big difference between "should be vs. actual". We are well aware that some CA will try to collect (even if it is illegal, or improper). I am just trying to give realistic advice to deal with a problem, that yes they should not have to. But, we know how it really works, and sometimes life's problems have to be dealt with whether wrong, unfair or illegal. As for the husband's credit reports, whoever was the executor of the estate should still have the legal right to pull the credit reports. Also, if the wife enters fraud alerts, she should be able to obtain copies.
A couple of small points here: You only need to file a fraud alert with one CRA; they'll notify the others. I got a fraud alert put on my files in early July. Since then, I've moved to a city in another state; I've had numerous things posted and changed; and I've requested two credit inquiries. All said and done, I've not received one phone call or notification. I wonder what it takes to trigger them to actually check on something? If ID theft has happened, which it sounds like it has, you might want to contact the FBI. Local police can't do much outside their own jurisdiction. Having a police report isn't going to do much good with the CRAs. It's my understanding that the FBI can gain access to the CRAs and all that stuff.
A deceased person should not have a credit file to put a fraud alert on. And there is no way to tell whether it is a matter of ID theft, or mis-addressing, mis-forwarding, one company buying a decades old mailing list - then reselling it to other companies, one company which the husband did business with merging with another company - then reselling their database to other companies, or some other possible explanation.
