I have been trying to resolve a fraudulent account that was opened in my name for Sprint and resulted in fraudulent inquiries. In December 2002, I informed Sprint that I did not own charged off account that was appearing on my credit profile as a collection. The fraud account was opened in 2001 and charged off in September 2002. This charged off account (via Collectech) appeared on my Equifax and TransUnion credit report. After Sprint obtained and verified my credentials, I was advised that they would conduct an investigation and forward results to me. One week later, a review of my Equifax credit report shows that Sprint ran a â??DTCâ? inquiry. Equifax states this is a running of my SSN to see what other addresses are used with my SSN. Equifax also stated that these types of inquiries do not count against you. My issue is not the DTC inquiries In February 2003, I met with a mortgage company to discuss their program and showed them copies of my credit report. I was advised to get a letter in reference to the unresolved Sprint fraudulent account, as well as another account in which I was an authorized user. On March 11, 2003, I contacted Sprint and advised them that the fraudulent account was still appearing on my credit report. I did not have the account number, but gave the rep my SSN in order to look up in their system all accounts under my SSN. Sprint located a closed account which was legitimate and paid in full, as well as the fraudulent unpaid account. Sprint apologized that this matter was not taken care of sooner. Sprint verified my credentials once again and after approximately 10 minutes advised that this matter has now been cleared up and that they would send me a letter to present for my mortgage. Sprint faxed the letter to me that same day. On March 12, 2003, I received notifications from Equifax and Experian that an inquiry was placed on my credit profile. I immediately obtained copies of my Equifax and Experian credit reports and noticed hard inquiries placed on Equifax and Experian. As a result of the inquiries, Equifax and Experian credit scores dropped 3-5 points. I immediately, called Sprint and requested that the hard inquiry be removed. Sprint refused. On March 25, I received notification from Sprint â??thankingâ? me, but denying my application for an extension of credit. Reasons for denial: Charged Off Account and Negative Previous Payment History. Sprint pulled three (3) hard inquiries from the major CRAs, plus one from a company by the name of Profile Screening Service. On March 28, ACORN Housing pulled my credit report (with my authorization) for mortgage review. Negative Scoring Factors for two of the CRAs listed excessive inquiries in the past 6 months. Included in this negative scoring factor were the 3 recent unauthorized inquiries from Sprint. As I already know that Sprint did not have a permissible purpose, on April 4, 2003, I sent a demand letter to Sprint for $4,000 for each illegal pull of my credit report with Equifax, Experian, TransUnion, and Profile Screening Service. By the way, has anyone heard of Profile Screening? I sent the demand letter via Express Mail and gave Sprint 15 days to respond to my letter. It is my intention to settle for $4,000 for each illegal pull. At no time, did Sprint advise me that they were reviewing my credit report nor did I give Sprint my authorization to review my credit report. I know some would say that Sprint had a permissible purpose due to a "business transaction" initiated by me. However, Sprint can not effectively use this argument, as they have clearly stated that they reviewed my credit reports with the CRAs and have decided to deny my credit application. Should Sprint prove to be difficult, is there anything else I can use to force them to accept their liability for accessing my credit reports. Can I also sue them for obtaining my credit report on a fraudulent basis? Is there anyway that I can include CRAs in this lawsuit as Sprint basically compromised themselves by stating their permissible purpose was via my application for credit? Any thoughts on how I should proceed would be welcomed.
If they don't respond to the first letter, you can send an ITS to their Agent of Service, then follow thru! I'm not an attorney, but I believe that is what the 1000 no PP suite would cover The CRA's are also entitled to 1000, but they would have to agree to be included as a plaintiff, or sue themselves. I've often wondered why this part is in the FCRA. Why would you sue your clients for something like this? When they are already protected by the certification?
