Don Davis www.htlnw.com 360-652-9994
When it comes to the credit reporting agencies (CRA’s), Equifax, TransUnion and Experian, do you ever wonder how much they care about you and the information they carry about your entire financial life?
Well in reality they don’t care much, if at all. You are really not their customer. You are profitable data.
The creditors, lenders, collection agencies and those looking to buy their lists of your information are their customers, NOT you. You are a commodity to the CRA’s whose main business, contrary to popular belief, is to sell your information. One of the CRA’s makes almost half of its income from the sale of data lists.
You, in fact, are a cost to them not an income stream. If you have issues with the information that the CRA’s use to determine your credit score and challenge the report(s), it costs them money to let you be heard. There are laws that require your information be accurate (as much as 79% of all credit reports contain wrong information). But enforcing those laws requires you to file suit if the information isn’t changed when you submit the challenging documents.
A lot of people are surprised when they find out that the CRA’s are just companies that answer only to their shareholders to maintain profitability and a return on their investments not a government agency. I dare say that nothing in their business plan has anything to do with making you a satisfied Equifax, TransUnion or Experian customer. And their “Customer Service” departments that service your requests are often outsourced somewhere over seas to further reduce costs (and increase your frustration).
So when it comes to your credit report and the CRA’s and their interest in you and doing the right thing by making certain that those three little numbers that determine your financial character is correct, do you think they really care? After all a customer is someone who pays for a service and by paying for that service they can expect “customer service”. So now do you still think you are their customer?
Don
