I have a dismissed lawsuit on my cr. Nothing happened, no one appeared in court. Is it legal to report this and use it against me? If not, what grounds can I use to have it removed? Thanks!
I had a similar situation a few months ago with TU. They were showing a civil suit filed against me for $10K--a bogus "personal injury" suit resulting from a minor traffic accident. All I did was call TU and explain that I, the defendant, won the suit and thus no $$$ was ever awarded to the plaintiff. A week or two later I got an updated copy of my report with the suit entry deleted, no hassles involved. So it should be pretty easy for you to fix. I do agree that it doesn't really belong there in the first place.
I once sued a water company for overcharging me on the water bills and it was reported as a Derog. on my credit reports: Good reason to make it illegal to report suits!
I had already disputed it, so right now I am on the phone with them. She put me on hold for probably 15 minutes to look up the verification from the courts. She came back and started talking to me about a tax lien! I told her it was a dismissed suit , with no legal decision against me. She said it does not matter, it will stay on my credit report for 7 years. I told her NO it will not! I then told her to read to me, right now, from the FCRA what right she has to keep this on my report. She put me on hold and I was put through to another woman who told me that it did not matter whether it was dismissed or not, it is still a public record and it stays for 7 years. She told me that she would have to get the full court documents from the court on Monday to see why it was filed and what happened. These people are really frustrating! They are maybe almost as stubborn as me!! Anyone have any legal info I can use? Thanks!
This is what the FCRA has to say about this: § 605. Requirements relating to information contained in consumer reports [15 U.S.C. § 1681c] (a) Information excluded from consumer reports. Except as authorized under subsection (b) of this section, no consumer reporting agency may make any consumer report containing any of the following items of information: (1) Cases under title 11 [United States Code] or under the Bankruptcy Act that, from the date of entry of the order for relief or the date of adjudication, as the case may be, antedate the report by more than 10 years. (2) Civil suits, civil judgments, and records of arrest that from date of entry, antedate the report by more than seven years or until the governing statute of limitations has expired, whichever is the longer period. (3) Paid tax liens which, from date of payment, antedate the report by more than seven years. (4) Accounts placed for collection or charged to profit and loss which antedate the report by more than seven years.(1) (5) Any other adverse item of information, other than records of convictions of crimes which antedates the report by more than seven years.1 (b) Exempted cases. The provisions of subsection (a) of this section are not applicable in the case of any consumer credit report to be used in connection with (1) a credit transaction involving, or which may reasonably be expected to involve, a principal amount of $150,000 or more; (2) the underwriting of life insurance involving, or which may reasonably be expected to involve, a face amount of $150,000 or more; or (3) the employment of any individual at an annual salary which equals, or which may reasonably be expected to equal $75,000, or more. So it appears that they can report it. That being the case, I wonder why experian (credit data southwest) isn't reporting my lawsuit against them? Maybe I can get them on another violation for not making a complete and accurate report for me.
This addresses what has to be removed from a report after a certain length of time. It still dosen't answer my question of what Info. is legal to report to a CRA in the first place.
From what Info. I have seen All information no matter what it is is fair game to report as there don't seem to be any restrictions on this. Am I correct on this?
Just like they do for anything else==Make up one! Sure does I haven't found any restrictions on what they are allowed to report. They make EM up.
It should be illegal to report all law suits. The point is it lowers your score and they use it to add fees and raise your finance rate.
I asked the woman at Equifax this same question. I explained that this lawsuit was "empty." It has no content. Nothing happened. There is no judgement or any other negative legal decision against me as a result of it. She said it stays because sometimes a lawsuit is filed and settled out of court, then dismissed, so therefore it is still a negative item. I asked her if I could go to the court house and file lawsuits against all my neighbors, then dismiss them just to mess with their credit. She said no, only lawsuits filed by a business would be reported, not ones filed by individuals. Not Fair!!!
That is pure B.S. I have an entry in the public records section re:a lawsuit filed against me by an individual.
I had 1 of each from 1995. The one that went to default I successfully disputed, but the one that was dismissed is still appearing on one of my reports.
