Are credit bureaus out of control?

[NW Admin]

I for one believe that credit bureaus are far too unregulated and are running rampant with their power. They are destroying people's lives for the sake of their own pockets.

I personally have credit problems which I have been trying to repair for many years now. I have learned a LOT about the working of the 3 credit bureaus (Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion). I have learned that there is a lot of shady business going on with them.

I always thought that the credit bureaus were untouchable. That once something was on your credit report, you were doomed and there was nothing you could do about it. Well, let me back up. I initially never thought of my credit report at all. I thought it would always be accurate and I didn't need to worry about what was going on with it. WRONG!

Studies show that over 70% of credit reports contain errors. That means everything from typos to accounts that don't even belong to you. And apparantly, the credit bureaus make money when your credit report is not so great.

I personally discovered that I had accounts on there from companies that were no longer in existence. It took a while, but they had to remove them. I found out that accounts were listed more then once and got them removed. And somehow, among all of the disputes, someone went in and changed my birthdate!

I now have credit monitoring and score watch with Equifax. Honestly, it's like an investor watching the stock market go up and down. It's enough to drive you mad. There is a little section for each account that says "past due amount" followed by the amount your are past due, if any. I have no past due accounts and haven't for years. So my past due says "N/A". But I have noticed that they occasionally go in and "update" the account so I get these alerts saying "past due amount changed from N/A to N/A". So basicly... no change. However, EVERY time they do that, my score drops! I get alerts telling my why my score changed and that past due change is what does it.

So I have called Equifax numerous times to complain. The people on the phones clearly have no idea what they are talking about. They have no reason for the drop in score and can't give me any explanation. It's bull ****! To top it all off, they barely speak English and aren't even in America. That right there is just wrong to me. No offense to anyone reading this, but how are you going to hire someone in India or wherever they are, to provide customer service for the AMERICAN credit system?? That would be like if I went to Japan, slaughtering the Japanese language, and worked as a telephone person at their police station. It wouldn't make any sense. People seeking help would get really frustrated with me.

My other pet peeve is how they rank their credit scores. I have been paying my accounts on time for several years. I have some bad things on my credit that are really old. I have been working hard to increase my credit score and got it up 100 points in a year. Last July I leased a brand new 2009 Toyota Camry which caused my credit score to drop. In December, I was in a bad car accident where some guy ran a red light and totalled my car. So my lease was paid off in full by insurance and closed. Well, because that account was closed, even though there was never a late payment and it was paid in full, and even though it lowered my amount of debt... my credit score dropped significantly. So then I leased another 2009 Camry to replace the destroyed one and guess what... my score dropped AGAIN! All my hard work down the drain because I did what I should be entitled to do... without penatly... because I have the credit and income to do so. Does that seem fair to anyone else?

The whole point of the credit system is to determine your credit worthiness. So why is it that when someone has good credit and then uses their good credit to purchase a home or a car... they are penalized for it and take a huge hit on their credit? I think that is wrong and should be removed from their calculations. I can understand penalizing someone if they go out and open 10 new accounts and are being irresponsible, but not for someone who has ONE car.

And for those of you dealing with collection accounts... do you know that there is NO LAW stating that ANYTHING must be on your credit report?? Oh no. There is not one thing on your credit report that any law says must be there. The credit bureaus and collection agencies want you to believe the law says "collection accounts must remain on your report for 7 years", but the truth actually is "credit bureaus are required to REMOVE any negative information after 7 years". It is merely a rule to prevent the bureaus from keeping that garbage on there forever. But there is no law that says they cannot remove it prior to seven years. The bureau and the company reporting the account can remove it at any time. So if anyone tries to tell you otherwise, then they are lying.

Credit bureaus are publicly traded companies. They get paid by other companies to make them money. That's all it is about... money.

And do you know that when a bureau is conducting a dispute, that they use an electronic system called eOscar that collects credit history, reports it back to the agent investigating your dispute, and then that agent has only 4 minutes to decide if you are right or wrong. They have a matching system and if 3 out of 4 items are right, then they assume you are wrong. That is what I read on the internet already.

I'm sorry, but I think Experian, Equifax, TransUnion, and even ChexSystems has way too much power and it way too out of control. They rule our lives based off of inadequate systems, lies, money, and errors. I believe something needs to be done about this!

[LOTUS]

I think it's stupid that there are 3 credit bureaus and all three have different scoring models and will show different things. Not everyone reports to all 3 which I think should be mandatory. I think if you are going to report something about someone, it should be to all three credit bureaus. Then those 3 should be legally responsible for ensuring that they are all reporting the same accurate information. The only difference should be their scoring model which should still be fair, but would allow for some slight differences.

Because what happens if you have a loan that you have paid on time for a year and only one out of three bureaus are reporting it? You end up with one bureau having a higher score and then two bureaus with a lower score. So you try to go buy something like a house and the lender is going to use the middle score. You get screwed out of a good interest rate that you should be entitled to because of that. IT'S NOT RIGHT.