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Experian - countless violations

Wednesday, June 21, 2006

Experian NOT providing any address for disputes anywhere

As I’m writing a snail mail dispute for a client, I was looking for the correct address to send his dispute to.  You may recall that Experian frequently changes addresses so they don’t have to process the disputes and they return the snail mailed disputes as undeliverable.

My client had purchased the myFICO Experian report and it did NOT contain an address.

I searched all over the Experian website and found no address.

Then I reviewed my most recent dispute results and guess what:

It does NOT contain any address for Experian!!!

Everywhere I looked they wanted consumers to dispute online.  Why?

1) They require that you PURCHASE a report directly from them to dispute online.

2) They do NOT disclose any online disputes with their initial disclosures or in response to your discovery requests.  That’s how they’re going to get dismissed unless YOU are an excellent record keeper.

I even called the number on my dispute results which do NOT contain the disclosure of your rights and I was unable to get an address for snail mailed disputes.

Sue hard and fast!

The consumer attorneys so sold out and the FTC is obviously totally corrupt and allows the Experian extortion of YOUR money to be able to submit disputes.

URL e-mailed to Marc Carlson, Jones Day, the Experian attorney in my case.

I have another complaint:

[This URL]

Do I need to send that to someone at Experian or can you arrange to have addresses put on the reports, investigation results, Experian website and phone system?

Thanks,

Christine

Sunday, June 18, 2006

6/17/06 amended complaint against Experian and ConsumerInfo.com

For the 2003 suit:

The amended complaint

Friday, June 16, 2006

Back from the Dallas Experian depositions

I’m sorry I didn’t post, was so busy with my objection to the Equifax motion for summary judgment (still have to post that) and thought I’d have “high speed” Internet access at the motel.  Ended up going to a Starbucks on Monday to get my email and then was too busy with the depos.

Just got back to over 1,000 emails ...  If you don’t get a reply by Sunday, please resend it because I probably deleted it with the SPAM.

There’s so much to post, I don’t even know where to begin.  On Tuesday I talked to Kimberly Hughes and she’s definitely not qualified to provide declarations to creditors to get them dismissed and I think the transcript will show that she committed perjury.

She was quite nice and it really bothered me when I got back to the motel and I realized that I just spent the day with a company woman AND a button pusher.

It’s one thing to know that these people are out there, sitting at the same table with two of them is different.  With the lawyers you expect it, but Kimberly Hughes seemed like a “normal” person, kids, etc.  Yet, she is not at all concerned with the fact that she plays such an important role in causing many thousands of deaths ever year, not to mention the pain and suffering of the many millions who work their asses off to pay their bills on time—only to NOT get the credit rating they deserve because Experian is so vile and deliberately implements procedures to ensure maximum INACCURACY of consumer reports.

I just don’t get it.  She went to college.  She can’t be that stupid. 

Then again, she was just as NOT knowledgeable as I expected.  I don’t know if it’s just an act.

Experian had two people there on Wednesday.  The guy who was supposed to be the expert on credit scores was a huge waste of time.  It would be funny if it didn’t cost me so much money.  I’ll have to schedule more depositions and obviously have to take this to the judge because I didn’t get many answers.

I got a lot of info about Experian procedures, some info on how “subscriber” (creditor, reseller, etc.) accounts are set up and inquiries.  Apparently Experian ignores all consumer complaints about inquiries w/o permissible purpose.  They merely give the subscriber the opportunity to verify or delete the inquiry and Experian does NOT investigate the FCRA violations or take any action to stop them.

Experian couldn’t care less WHY subscribers access credit reports after the accounts have been set up.  Since the subscribers PAY for the reports and for reporting, Experian doesn’t want to cut them off.  Every report sold is more $$$ in the bank - who cares whether the subscriber had a permissible purpose?  Certainly not Experian.

It also seems that Experian not only condones the Capital One failure to report the credit limits, but it actively refuses to report the limits in response to consumer disputes to accommodate Capital One - no doubt one of their major clients.

I also asked about the reporting of collections as tradelines, didn’t get much there—YET.  My American Agencies collection was reported as tradeline, so I will check into that further.

As soon as I got the transcripts I’ll post the details.  I’ll also post what I learned about taking depositions in general, but first I have to get some sleep.

Monday, June 05, 2006

Hearing re. Experian protective order: no video, but I get to ask about credit scores

I just posted my 6/2/06 filing to oppose the Experian motion for protective order at CreditCourt

Judge Broomfield had scheduled a telephone hearing for this afternoon and while I don’t have the written order yet, here’s the summary of the 19 minute hearing:

1) I’m not allowed to video tape the depos provided that Experian agrees to have the deponents present at the trial. 

That’s really too bad and it means that a settlement is less likely.  Not that Experian has made any settlement offers, but I didn’t think they’d want to take this to trial and with the video, it really didn’t seem that necessary.  Now I have one more reason not to settle—unless they make an offer I just can’t refuse, which is highly unlikely.

I really want to drive home the point that it’s NOT cool to lie for your employer.

I know, people do it all the time, but I really believe if the liars are publicly exposed, at least some people will think twice about signing false declarations under oath.

We’ll see how the depo goes, but I’d sure like to have the judge and jury see that Kimberly Hughes either lied or is simply not competent to provide declarations.  Even without video, and of course there’s never any prosecution for perjury, maybe Ms. Hughes and the CRA attorneys will take notice that not all litigants are only after fat settlement checks and willing not to draw public attention to those declarations.

2) Confidential and proprietary Experian data.

Experian attorney Carlson stated that to answer my questions, Ms. Hughes would have provide me with confidential Experian documents.  Obviously, I can’t state whether I agree to confidentiality until I reviewed the docs.  So there will probably be another hearing regarding that after the depo.

I will be forever grateful to the person who sent me the eOscar fields and rules along with the background.  If I didn’t have these docs to include as exhibits, I’m sure Experian would have tried to make eOscar info confidential and proprietary too.  As so often, it’s much more important to have info then to be able to authenticate it.  You know when to call their bluff.

3) Most important to me, I’m allowed to ask general questions about the Experian credit scores.

This is what was discussed most in this hearing.  I had to explain that I filed my first depo notice for 6/13 for the Kimberly Hughes depo to go over her discovery responses and declarations, etc. and since I expected her to be not very knowledgeable (due to her declarations), I scheduled the 30(b)(6) depo for the 14th and it’s up to Experian to determine which person to have deposed regarding the subjects I listed:

Experian is directed to designate a person or persons to testify on its behalf in the following matters:

a. The Experian credit scores sold to consumers and the data utilized to calculate the scores and its impact on the scores.

b. The Experian credit scores (such as Sureview) sold to creditors and the data utilized to calculate the scores and its impact on the scores.

c. E-OSCAR, ACDVs, investigation procedures and furnisher training.

d. Sale of consumer credit data to resellers of consumer disclosures and compliance.

e. Certification of users of credit reports and investigation of complaints about resellers providing consumer reports without permissible purpose.

f. Procedures to assure accuracy of consumer credit reports

g. The data contained in consumer disclosures.

As always, I learned from my mistakes what those depo notices are and what to file since I still don’t have any legal advice.  It’s all trial and error ...

Carlson stated that Kimberly Hughes was qualified to answer most of my questions.  It took a while to get Carlson to identify which subjects he objected to and what Hughes would not be able to answer:  credit scores.

He actually argued that Experian has no knowledge about FICO scores—yes, “FICO scores” and explained to the judge that Fair Isaac is a different company, bla bla bla ...

Do you see anything in my notice about “FICO” scores?

Fortunately, I got the opportunity to explain that I only wanted information about the EXPERIAN scores and that I’m not at all interested in their secret formula. 

Carlson continued to argue that there is nothing in the FCRA to allow me to submit questions about scores and that the FCRA excludes scoring info from the disclosure requirements.

Again, I was able to explain that it is relevant to establish my damages to find out how the incorrect status dates and missing credit limits were utilized when EXPERIAN sold its scores to creditors.  It is one thing for a CRA to claim that it does not know and does not care how important specific data is to creditors and scores when it only collects and disseminates data, but Experian goes one step further and analyzes the data for use in its own scores.

Finally Carlson disclosed that the persons knowledgeable about credit scores are located in Southern California.  Judge Broomfield decided that they should send someone to Dallas.

I actually had a friend from California visit for a few days in late April and I would not have had a problem at all with giving him a ride to So Cal and I already have a place in LA for a depo.  Carlson has been extraordinarily uncooperative, simply not responding to my e-mails, promising additional responses after a 1 hour discovery phone call and not sending ANYTHING, ignoring my subsequent e-mails ...  I STILL don’t even know who verified the ConsumerInfo.com discovery responses.

I don’t think he would treat another attorney like that, I guess he doesn’t think he needs to extend professional courtesy to me.  Our communications have been limited to court filings and hearings.  The previous Experian attorneys were a lot nicer and at least didn’t always ignore me.

So I don’t know exactly what’s going to happen now.  I’ve made my reservations for the car and motel and it wouldn’t surprise me if I’d just have to be there on the 14th to see if anyone shows up.  Well, maybe they’ll clue me in on their plan on the 13th.

Judge Broomfield also mentioned that if I had to schedule additional depos because I didn’t get answers they would be in Phoenix.  Still a 250 mile drive, but beats going to Dallas.

All in all, I feel very confident and excited.  I have so many questions about my disputes, the inquiries and the Experian status date.  I really think that they either need a NEW field or they need to make sure that the status date is the date of the first permanent delinquency, just like the date of last activity (DLA) for Equifax.

Trans Union has its problems too, but they now SOMETIMES report the date of last activity.  Although it’s unclear how scores determine the default date for TU and that’ll have to be someone else’s suit.  The SOL for my claims about derogatory reporting by TU long expired.

Anyway, I can’t wait to get some answers from Experian!

It’s hard to focus on my response to the Equifax msj, due today.  I’m so grateful to Target for establishing that it’s ok to be a few days late.

Friday, June 02, 2006

FICO score dropped 18 points from 754 because of $4 new balance

My Equifax FICO score dropped from 754 on 5/19 to 736 on 5/28, with the exact same score factors, B/L ratio at 33%.

The only difference is a new $4 balance on a credit card.

Since I’ve paid the $4, I wanted to dispute the balance on this Cap One Kmart account.  I had previously submitted that same dispute with the request for the correct reporting of the $7,000 limit.

Of course Experian did NOT update with the correct limit and to make matters worse, they now refused the dispute entirely.

Not only are 18 points a significant FICO score drop, but it so happens that a stated income construction loan requires a 740 minimum FICO score. 

Another interesting twist is that Capital One IMMEDIATELY reports substantial balance increases to the CRAs, but then Experian has the nerve to REFUSE to update to paid.

It is absolutely amazing that the longer I research scores and reporting, the more totally unfair credit reporting practices I discover.  And those corrupt consumer lawyers do nothing.