Of course, I waited until the last day to ask ;-) Going to court tomorrow with equifax, who refuses to change false info, even though i have proof. One of my claims is, that they did not mark my report as being 'in dispute' , when informed, that the info is wrong. In their response to court they claim, that thy do not have to mark items in dispute, if disputed by the consumer. They only have to do that when the 'credit furnisher' reports the item in dispute. I have named fcra sec 605 (f), but it's not clear, that they have to respond to consumer disputes, because it refers to sec 623, which talks about the crdit furnishers. Does anybody have aditional ammunition? thanks
I offered several settlement letters over the course of the past 3-4 months (deletion of this entry and some others), but they aren't interested in settling.
That is correct. They do not have to mark in dispute when a consumer disputes an item on their report. Their only obligation is to reinvestigate the item and report the status of their findings within 30 days of receipt of the dispute.
Then they are not recording the CURRENT status of the information. Once the consumer disputes info., that info. becomes currently disputed information. To fail to record this fact is refusing to record it's current status. Definition: http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=current cur·rent ( P ) Pronunciation Key (kûrnt, kr-) adj. Belonging to the present time: current events; current leaders. Being in progress now: current negotiations. Prevalent, especially at the present time: As noted in the Staff Opinion below the requirements of 611 are "triggered" by a dispute received from the consumer. Lets re-read 611 (A) 1 (A). § 611. Procedure in case of disputed accuracy [15 U.S.C. § 1681i] (a) Reinvestigations of disputed information. (1) Reinvestigation required. (A) In general. If the completeness or accuracy of any item of information contained in a consumer's file at a consumer reporting agency is disputed by the consumer and the consumer notifies the agency directly of such dispute, the agency shall reinvestigate free of charge and record the current status of the disputed information, or delete the item from the file in accordance with paragraph (5), before the end of the 30-day period beginning on the date on which the agency receives the notice of the dispute from the consumer. They might try to argue that they could wait until the 30 days is up before adding the in dispute notation, but not to do so at all is absurd. But in the staff opinion below FTC separates the 2 items, (#1 Recording the CURRENT status, and; #2 Deleting if it cannot be verified). FTC seems to imply that #2 must happen within 30 days but #1 must happen immediately. Besides, the CRA is required to notify the DF within 5 days of receipt of the dispute. Once the DF is made aware that a dispute exists is required to list the item as disputed. Are we expected to believe that this weird circular logic lets EQ off the hook just because a dispute was sent to the CRA rather than the DF? Besides, we all know that we have no legal basis upon which to file an FCRA complaint unless we first dispute through the CRA's. Now they're saying that because you did dispute through the CRA you have no complaint? LizardKing has already pointed out: http://consumers.creditnet.com/straighttalk/board/showthread.php?s=&threadid=27168&highlight=private "I want everyone to know, in order to sue a provider of information, under the FCRA you must sue under this claim. 15 U.S.C. § 1681s-2(b) In order to sue under part 15 U.S.C. § 1681s-2(b) you must first attempt to dispute the item through the credit bureaus. Only after is has been verified by the original creditor do you have the right to sue in court." http://www.ftc.gov/os/statutes/fcra/cohan2.htm Division of Financial Practices UNITED STATES OF AMERICA FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION WASHINGTON, D.C. 20580 August 1, 2000 Ben Cohan, Vice President of Operations Chase Credit Research Corp. 6350 Laurel Canyon Boulevard North Hollywood, CA 91606 Dear Mr. Cohan: This letter responds to your inquiry posing five questions about the applicability of various sections of the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) to the activities of re-sellers of consumer reports. I summarize each inquiry below, in italics, with my response following. 1. Is a re-seller that has no affiliation with any of the national credit repositories required to comply with Section 612(b), which requires each consumer reporting agency that maintains a file on a consumer to make all disclosures mandated by Section 609, when the re-seller "does not maintain files but rather archives" consumer reports? (Emphases in original) Yes, a consumer reporting agency ("CRA"), including a mortgage reporting agency or re-seller, is required to make the consumer disclosures prescribed by Section 609, whether the company designates its records "files" or "archives" or uses any other terminology for the information it retains on a consumer. As your inquiry recognizes, Section 612 of the FCRA requires that "[e]each consumer reporting agency that maintains a file on a consumer shall make all disclosures pursuant to Section 609 without charge to the consumer" under specified circumstances. Section 609, in turn, provides that every CRA shall disclose to the consumer "[a]ll information in the consumer's file at the time of the request." We reach our conclusion that these provisions require disclosure of all information because of the inclusive definition of "file" in Section 603(g) of the FCRA: The term "file", when used in connection with information on any consumer, means all of the information on that consumer recorded and retained by a consumer reporting agency regardless of how the information is stored. (Emphasis added) The use of words such as "retained" and "stored" suggests that a CRA cannot escape its obligation to make disclosure of information on a consumer simply by placing the information in a category that it considers archival.(1) 2. Can a furnisher of information to CRAs require a re-seller of consumer reports to provide the "written consent of a consumer" before the furnisher complies with Section 623(b) of the FCRA? No. Section 623(b) requires the furnisher to conduct an investigation of disputed information when it is notified by a CRA pursuant to Section 611(a)(2) that a consumer disputes the completeness or accuracy of the furnisher's information with a consumer reporting agency. The consumer's dispute to the CRA under Section 611(a)(1)(A) triggers the furnisher's responsibility to investigate, and the furnisher cannot frustrate the aims of the obligation (or delay the process) by requiring the consumer to, in effect, double-authorize the investigation in a manner that is more burdensome than required by that provision.(2) 3. Is a re-seller required to comply with Section 611(a)(1) when the re-seller is unable to investigate the information that a consumer disputed?(3) (Emphasis in original) Yes. Section 611(a)(1) requires the consumer reporting agency, upon dispute by the consumer of the completeness or accuracy of any item of information, to "reinvestigate . . . and record the current status of the disputed information, or delete the item from the file" if it cannot be verified within 30 days. Section 611(a)(2) requires prompt notice to the furnisher of information of a consumer dispute. The furnisher's responsibility to conduct an investigation of disputed information, imposed in Section 623, is a discrete requirement, separate from the CRA's obligation to record the current status or delete unverified information. Thus, if the furnisher fails or refuses to conduct an investigation (which may constitute a separate violation of the FCRA by the furnisher), the CRA must still comply with Section 611. We can see here that the issue of responsibility to the DF and the CRA are separate issues. In other words not to be co-joined by enemy council. 100% of the requirements of 611 fall upon the CRA regardless of what the DF does or doesn't do. 4. If the answer to question 3 is 'yes', does Section 611(a)(5)(A) require the re-seller to delete the disputed information? Yes; if the consumer reporting agency (re-seller) cannot investigate within 30 days (with some qualifications contained in the FCRA), then disputed item(s) must be deleted. As noted above, the CRA's obligation to comply with Section 611 is triggered by a consumer dispute - it is statutorily separate from the furnisher's responsibility to investigate, and it does not require any form of "written consent from the consumer." 5. When a re-seller furnishes a consumer report to a lender, and subsequently both the lender and the consumer claim that the request for the report was initiated in error by the lender, is the national repository that reports the "inquiry" permitted to remove the inquiry from its file at the request of the re-seller? No. If a CRA supplies a consumer report, it may reflect that event by an inquiry notation. There is no legal or policy requirement to display the inquiry (other than to the consumer in connection with disclosure pursuant to Section 609(a)(3)). The fact that a consumer report was requested "in error" does not nullify the fact that the report was furnished; that information must be retained by the CRA so that it can comply with Sections 609(a)(3) and 611(d), among other reasons. I hope that this information is useful. The views that are expressed above are views of the Commission's staff and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Commission or of any individual Commissioner. Sincerely, Christopher W. Keller Attorney I wish we would have had more time to talk about this case Varinia. Good luck tomorrow, we'll all be thinkin about ya.
Endnotes: 1. If the information is retained by the CRA, it must disclose the information available "at the time of the request." For a CRA that updates the information in a consumer's file, this means that the agency need report only the information in the file at the time of the consumer's request. For a re-seller, it requires the disclosure of the "stored" or "retained" file. 2. Section 611(a)(1)(A) requires no written statements of any kind by the consumer, stating that the CRA's reinvestigation duties are triggered when the consumer "notifies the agency directly" of the dispute. 3. As an example of such inability to investigate, your inquiry suggests "such as when a consumer refuses to provide a written consent to the re-seller for investigating the disputed information." As noted in response to inquiry #2, however, no such written consent is required; the consumer dispute itself gives rise to the obligation (and implicit consumer authorization) to investigate, and the furnisher cannot condition its investigation upon consumer consent. Sometimes we forget, but always study your Staff Opinion Endnotes too.
Butch, thank you for all the good info. I printed it out this morning, but didn't really need a lot of my stuff. Better to be too prepared, than not enough ;-). I ended up getting exaclty what i wanted all along.
yes and no ;-). Look at my post "I won!" The judge agreed to dismiss the case, if Equifax would be willing to change their records. That was exactly why I was suing them in the first place. They agree to do it and I got exactly what I wanted ;-) varinia
