Cell Phone Inquiries

[Anonymous]

I was a T-mobile customer. I went to a verizon store to see if if they sold Sim cards compatible with my Moto G. The sales agent asked for my info (ostensibly to pull up my old verizon account from 10 years ago). But he told me they didn't sell the sim cards, so I left the store and went with AT&T.

Now I find out, he ran a credit check on me, which is showing up as a hard inquiry on my credit report and won't disappear for 2 years.

Is there any way to get this removed? Does the fact that I was silly and gave him my info, mean I can't dispute it? Is Verizon authorized to run a credit check this without telling you?

[ddemari]

u might want to call their corporate office in your region and lodge a complaint. I was online looking at hotspots and asked a chat rep. specifically if they woulde hard or soft me for a hot spot, she said soft and then they hard pulled me. I saved the chat but never followed up on them removing it. 

[takeshi74]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Is Verizon authorized to run a credit check this without telling you?

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For any company, permissible purpose as defined in the FCRA is all that is needed.  However, they really should notify you and I don't see how a credit pull is needed to tell you that they don't sell SIM's.  Lodge a complaint with Verizon and run it up the chain to see if you can get them to remove it.

Definitely be careful giving out your info.

[corradovr6]

hope op doesnt mind if i piggyback this post, also had a question related to cellphone. i switch from sprint to at & t and specificly asked the salesperson if it would be a hard inquiry porting my number to them, he said it probably wouldn't be as it didn't show up on his when he did it. then gave me a spiel that would it  definately would be one when i came back to get direct tv<-------------with one of those banter salesperson laughs, never told him i wanted direct tv. hard pull showed up couple days later, pi$$ed switched back right away. would i have any luck trying to get this removed since he really didn't tell me it definately would or wouldn't be a hard pull.

[RobertEG]

Permissible purpose is only obtained if you initiate a business transaction for which the business has a legitimate need to review our credit as part to the transaction.

Any 'ole business transaction does not give permissible purpose.

In the posted example, there was no legitimate business need for them to review your credit as part of your transaction. 

It is questinable as to whether you even intiated a business transaction, let alone one which involved a legitimate business need to review your credit report.

You were not applying for credit or entering into any agreement that gave any need for review of your credit.

They did not have permissible purpose under FCRA 604.

I would file a formal complaint with the CFPB for their improper pull of your credit report without permissible purpose.