Don't know the veracity of this, but I just got off the phone with Equifax about an AMEX account that was reinserted. In my discussions with the rep about the illegality of their reinsertion of the account, he blurted something out. He said he had a memo on his desk from American Express that stated that NO information will be released to the credit bureaus without specfic consent from the alleged account holder. He said I need to call AMEX and authorize release of the information so they can investigate. I was puzzled. I asked him "So if I did'nt call today and ask about this account, and AMEX did'nt release the info, you would have to delete". A very pregnant pause.."Yes we would have to". How could this be? This is too good to be true. Well I asked the rep off the record if this sounded right. He confirmed this, agreeing that this policy by AMEX is dumb and would lead to deletions by the thousands by default. Maybe AMEX is taking a chance and assuming that blacklist they keep will help with their bottom line. Lord knows the CRAs have'nt kept the bad risks off of them. Could this be the start of a trend?
I think there are some changes going on between AmEx and the CRA's. Citi also. Perhaps this is part of it.
