cancel
Showing results for 
Search instead for 
Did you mean: 

TRUE or FALSE: You CAN dispute Credit Inquiries!

tag

TRUE or FALSE: You CAN dispute Credit Inquiries!

I haven't seen this discussed much here, if at all.

 

From what I have read, you can NOT dispute Credit Inquires online.  You can only dispute over the phone or in writing.  But, you CAN dispute Credit Inquiries.

 

Does anyone here KNOW for certain if an individual can dispute Credit Inquiries?

 

Thanks.

Message 1 of 5
4 REPLIES 4
guiness56
Epic Contributor

Re: TRUE or FALSE: You CAN dispute Credit Inquiries!

You can but they are hard to get removed.  Your best bet would be to contact the creditor and ask them to recode to a SP.

Message 2 of 5

Re: TRUE or FALSE: You CAN dispute Credit Inquiries!

guiness56...How do you do that?

 

Let me share with you what I would like changed to a soft pull:

 

My old house I was renting was sold.  I had to move.  And, early this Spring I want to buy a house.  I wanted to remain month-to-month in the old house, but the owner decided to sell.  It was sold and I had to move.

 

Well, while signing a new lease, the realter (Watson) did a HARD PULL (done by an agency in Georgia called "LexisNexis-Tenant").  Oddly, I had been renting through Watson for 3 years in the old house.  Why they did a HARD PULL for the new application is beyond me - but they did!

 

Are you saying that I should contact Watson and ask them (i.e., Goodwill them) to change the HP to a SP?  Is there any legal reason why they can't do that?

 

Just curious, how does Watson go about changing their HARD PULL to a SOFT PULL?  If they agree, do they contact the CRA or do they go through their secondary soource "LexisNexis-Tenant" (which actually did the HARD PULL).

 

Thanks.

Message 3 of 5
llecs
Moderator Emeritus

Re: TRUE or FALSE: You CAN dispute Credit Inquiries!

Back in the day I had disputed some inquiries. From personal experience, inquiry damage is overrated and I certainly didn't need to do that (FICO didn't improve any when they disappeared) and a fraud alert was automatically placed on my CR (EQ only). The premise behind the FA was that if I am disputing an inquiry then therefore I'm declaring that it wasn't mine and thus must be a victim of ID theft and therefore the FA was placed by the CRA. Unrelated to your situation, I have seen some rare (and albeit older) examples in here of TLs being closed by the creditor after their inquiry was disputed. 

 

IMO, Watson was within their rights to pull your credit. Peoples' financial situation can change year to year and if I were a landlord I'd like to see updates to make sure the tenant is still in the financial situation to rent. 

 

FICO will stop scoring that inquiry early next spring (assuming it was placed early this spring). 

 

You could ask them to recode it. They don't have to, but you can always ask.

 

The reason it isn't talked about in here is because most of the folks who want to dispute inquiries do so just because they don't want to see them anymore. MyFICO has a rule in place that we can't advocate the disputing of accurate info and therefore you aren't apt to see that in here. 

Message 4 of 5
RobertEG
Legendary Contributor

Re: TRUE or FALSE: You CAN dispute Credit Inquiries!

The "legal" answer is yes if you dispute via a CRA, but no if you send a direct dispute to the party who made the inquiry.

 

Disputes sent to a CRA apply, under FCRA 611(a)(1)(A), to "any item of information contained in a consumer's file at a consumer reporting agency."

An inquiry is an item of informtion contaned in a consumer's credit file,and thus can be disputed under the FCRA dispute process if sent to the CRA.

If the consumer provides adequate identification of the inquiry being disputed and the basis for asseting its inaccuracy, the CRA is required to conduct a resonable reinvestigation of the dispute and report the resutls to the consumer.

 

Direct disputes relate to the ability of a consumer to dispute directly with a party who has reported information to their credit file.

In recognition of the fact that credit inquires are not information furnished to a consumer file, but rather the request to see what others have reported, the implementing rules for the direct dispute process, set forth at 16 CFR 660.4, specifically exempts direct dispute pertaiining to credit inquiries.

 

As for disputing with a CRA, the consumer must identify the asserted inaccuracy. 

FCRA 604 provides a lenghty list of permissible purposes that, if any party self-certifies to the CRA that any one or more apply to their inquiry, the CRA must provde them a copy of the consumer's credit report.  No approval of the consumer is required.  If a CRA has received a stated permissible purpose with an inquiry, their backs are covered under the statute, and they will rountinely rely upon the accuracy of the requestor's stated permissible purpose to dismiss any dispute over the legitimacy of having provided the credit report.

 

If the dispute is one of how the inquiry is coded, the basis for the dispute must show violation of some provision of the FCRA. 

Other than inquiries that provide a permissible purpose only of making an unsolicted offer of credit or insurance to a consumer, which the FCRA permits the CRA to provide only the consumer's name and address and prohibits the inquiry from being shown in any credit report provided to any party other than the consumer (i.e., a so-called "soft-pull"), the CRA is permitted to include a showing of that inquiry in any credit report they issue.

So the only legitimate statutory basis for challenging the showing of an inquiry in credit reports provided to others (which is what a so-called "hard-pull" is) is to show that the furnisher did not provide a legitimate permissible purpose listed under FCRA 604.

If the CRA has a stated permissible purpose in their file, they will again rely on its accuracy, and dismiss a dispute related to their ability to include a record of that dispute in credit reports they issue to others as lacking a showing of inaccuracy on their part.

 

You can always send the CRA a request for a copy of the statementt of permissible purpose provided by the inquiree under the provisions of FCRA 609(a)(1), and then challenge whether their stated permissible purpose provided in that certification is accurate.  Consumers dont have a copy of that acutal certification when they simply file a dispute, so often dont even know the basis for disputng their permissible purpose.  It's very tough.

By the time all of that wends its tortuous way, one year has usually expired since the date of the inquiry, and it is no longer being scored by FICO.

However, the CRA continues to include inquires for approx two years, so if disclosure of an inquiry is of concern upon a manual review of your credit report, it could possibly still be worth while to endure the hassle and pursue the CRA dispute process.  Most consumer's dont see the benefit worth the hassle.

 

 

 

Message 5 of 5
Advertiser Disclosure: The offers that appear on this site are from third party advertisers from whom FICO receives compensation.