Taking Experian to Small Claims

[virgo]

Hey everyone,

I will be in small claims court against Experian on March 23.

My main cause of action is the way they and all cb's troll courthouses and place the info on credit reports without following the guidelines set forth for Info Furnishers.

The FTC agrees with my position on this one.

Other items in contention are the usial; not correcting errors after being given proof; and another big one- they marked a five year old collection as 'new' which triggered a 67 point score drop.

Historically, Eperian sends some poor lackey with no authority to cross the street,
so it'll be interesting to see how it goes.

Wish me luck.

[pizzadude]

What damages are you seeking with your suit, and are you alleging violations of the FCRA ?

[RobertEG]

Since you are in the middle of litigating the issue, I doubt that you would want to post your legal position, but I would be interested in the outcome.

FCRA 603(p)(1) does specifically mention public record information as information that consumer reporting agencies regularly maintain as an indication of consumer credit worthiness.  I am not aware of a specific section of the FCRA that defines who is or is not considered a "furnisher of information" to a CRA.  That seems to be left to the FTC under section 607(d).

Sub-section  607(d)(1) requires the CRAs to provide to parties who "in the ordinary course of business furnishes information to the agency with respect to any consumer... a notice of such person's responsibilities under this title."

Section 607(d)(2) requires that the FTC "shall prescribe the content of notices under paragraph (1), and a consumer reporting agency shall be incompliance with this subsection if it provides a notice under paragraph (1) that is substantially similar to the Federal Trade Commission prescription under this paragraph."

Do you have a copy of the FTC-prescribed notice that covers those who furnish public record information?  I would be interested in its content.

This seems to be an area where what the FTC opines may, in fact, have some statutory clout.

[IOBA]

I would love to hear an update or the outcome --- whatever you can share with us.

Good luck!

[Anonymous]

wow, good luck with this adventure.  Please share what you can.

[AndySoCal]

In years past the public records were gathered manually form the court house. Today, that is not the case public reorrds are reported by the court to the credit bureaus. The "new" collection  was either reported by or re-reported by the colection agency to Experian. Experian will have the records of that in their defense.  YOu can take them to court but seriously doubt you will win unless you have factual proof..

[virgo]

Andysocal,

The courts, at least in California 'do not' report to cb's nor does the IRS.

The cb's still hire vendors to procure this information.

[Booner72]

You are my hero!  Good Luck.  Please let us know what happens.

[LS2982]

Were all rooting for you OP! Good luck!

[virgo]

Hello Robert,

I don't mind at all sharing. I'm hoping it will get this ugly little secret that the cb's are doing out in the open and stop it all together or force them to comply.

This may get long so I apologize.

First, you're about 607, the cb's maintain these items on someone's report. What it does'nt say is how it got there.

Public records are what they say, public. Anyone can go into a courthouse and dig through the dirty laundry. What they can't do, is take that info and place it on someone's credit report.

The first part of my complaint is, if the credit bureaus are actively obtaining my information for the purpose of placing it on my credit report, they are now 'Furnishers of Information' and are bound by the same laws as creditors and ca's.

FCRA 623 and because I'm in California, ccc 1785.25-1785.26 chapter 3.5 Obligations of Furnishers of Credit Information, states what the responsibilities are. The cb's themselves maintain that they don't add or remove info unless instructed to do so by the owner of a debt.

A furnishers of information defined in the law is anyone who in the ordinary course of business on a routine basis...

Not only is what they are doing routine but that is the only way that these kinds of judgements make they're way onto your credit report.

Secondly, and this is only with Experian, their credit monitoring is taking a five year old account and marking it as a new collection. Of course I disputed and of course they said they only report what the creditor reports. What they don't know in this particular case is that the old creditor is helping me and has tried to get Experian to fix the problem. My score dropped 67 points because of this.

I'd also like to just add that the FCRA and FDCPA are great tools but unfortunately they are sometimes vague. But consumers can bump up the laws with the help of their states civil codes which is what I have done with Experian.

I want to see it get so cost prohibitive for them to report public records that they discontinue the entire process.

As for the FTC, they were pretty much in the dark about the cb's hiring vendors to troll courthouses but when I told them my position they asked for the name and phone number of the person I'm dealing with at Experian and that the laws I cited in my complaint do apply but it is for a judge to decide the final outcome.


And believe me, I'm going after Equifax and Transunion next.

I hope this helped to explain my position.

Thanks for listening.