| Comment Number: | 522110-00038 |
| Received: | 5/18/2006 11:49:00 AM |
| Organization: | |
| Commenter: | Patrick Ryan |
| State: | IL |
| Subject: | Procedures to Enhance the Accuracy and Integrity of Information Furnished to Consumer Reporting Agencies |
| Title: | Advance Notice of Proposed Rulemaking |
| CFR Citation: | 16 CFR Parts 660 and 661 |
| No Attachments |
Comments:
I would like to see FACTA ammended to include specific verbiage concerning how investigations take place. As of now, the CRAs and furnishers of data merely match up name, address, and SSN, without looking into the specifics of the tradelines which are listed. For example, if there is a dispute about ABC bank reporting as "currently past due 120 days", when in reality the account has been closed for 3 years, the CRA contacts ABC bank and gives them the consumers name, address and SSN. ABC bank then compares that to their records and says "yes, it's verified as accurate". I would like to see a definition of "reasonable investigation", or at least an example of what a minimum would be (i.e. check records going back X years at a minimum) I would also like to see the CRAs actually provide a full "consumer file" as defined in FCRA, instead of the consumer REPORT that they currently provide to a consumer, regardless of what's requested by the consumer. For example, if I were to purchase a home valued at 250,000 dollars, the lender could request a full factual report, and deny me the loan based potentially inaccurate information which is unavailable to me. This needs to change. If the CRAs are maintaining data on consumers, the consumer should have access to that information. There also needs to be more "teeth" put into the law. As of now, many furnishers of data, as well as the CRAs are happy to ignore the rights of the individual, since the penalties are so small. If a collection agency deliberatley reports inaccurate information on 10,000 consumers, and due to their blatant violations of the law ends up collection from 9,990 of them, it's well worth the cost of paying the penalties to the 10 that enforce their rights. I would suggest that something be added that would forbid collection agencies from furnishing information to the CRAs at all if they are found to be in violation of FCRA.