FCRA – How to Dispute an Error

What is the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) and the California Consumer Credit Reporting Agencies Act (CCRAA)?

The FCRA and CCRAA are laws passed by our federal and state legislators to protect consumers from false credit reporting and promote fair lending.  These laws require that credit reporting agencies (e.g. Equifax, Experian, TransUnion) and credit furnishers (e.g. credit card companies and lenders) report accurate and complete information about your credit history.

What To Do If There Is An Error In Your Credit Report 

If you see an error on your credit report, you should submit a dispute to the credit reporting agencies reporting the incorrect information.  The FCRA requires that the credit reporting agency and credit furnisher conduct a “reasonable” and “non-cursory” investigation into your dispute, and “not merely rubberstamp information in the file.”  What a “reasonable” investigation entails is somewhat of a moving target.  However, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals recently provided some clarity on this issue, identifying “several factors that inform the reasonableness analysis”:

1. the furnisher’s relationship to the debt and to the consumer;
2. the level of detail in the credit reporting agency’s notice of dispute to the credit furnisher; and
3. the feasibility of implementing investigatory procedures, including training staff

See https://www.accountsrecovery.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/Gross-v.-CitiMortgage.pdf.

Importantly, regarding factor number 2 above, the more detail that you provide in the notice of dispute to the credit reporting agency, the more detail that the credit reporting agency can provide to the credit furnisher – which could only benefit you.

Steps You Can Take to Repair Your Credit

For example, let’s say that you’ve been diligently making your monthly payments on your credit card.  You go to buy a car and learn that your credit score is 150 points lower than you expected, and the auto finance company is trying to charge you a high interest rate.  You review your credit report and discover that your credit card company is inaccurately reporting your credit card account as 90 days past due.  In this case (and other similar cases), you should:

1. Prepare a detailed dispute to the credit reporting agencies. For instance, in the example above, in addition to explaining that you made all of your payments on the credit card account, provide copies of bank statements and/or cancelled checks showing that you made the payments.
2. Submit the dispute, online or via mail. See https://www.equifax.com/personal/credit-report-services/credit-dispute/; https://www.experian.com/disputes/main.html; https://www.transunion.com/credit-disputes/dispute-your-credit.
3. Review the response from the credit reporting agency. It’ll take up to 30 days to receive the response.  If the credit reporting agency explains that an investigation was conducted and information was updated, confirm precisely what information was updated, e.g. your updated payment history does not show past due payments, and the updated account status shows the account is current.
4. About 30 days after receiving the credit reporting agency’s response, obtain a copy of your credit report (for free at, https://www.annualcreditreport.com/index.action) and confirm that the credit reporting on the account was updated to show the account is current, with no late payment history.

The United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit recently explained, “Our nation’s credit reporting system relies on accurate reporting both by credit reporting agencies and by the entities that provide information to those agencies about consumers’ debts” (i.e. credit furnishers).  See https://www.accountsrecovery.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/Gross-v.-CitiMortgage.pdf.  Sometimes credit reporting agencies and credit furnishers make mistakes.  If they do, they should be responsible; you shouldn’t have to pay for their mistakes.

If you feel that there is, or was, inaccurate information in your credit report, let’s do something about it.  Call (833) 729-5529 for a free consultation.