Please Give Ideas About Experian Credit Record ???

Q: I was refused an application for a Cahoot online bank account due to my credit rating from Experian. I wrote to Experian to get my record, and was surprised to find the record contained zero information! (though I have no history of bad debt). Firstly they did not have any record of my address on the electoral register (I have only lived there for a month and only filled in the electoral register form recently, so that's probably to be expected), and they have no record of my previous addresses, even though I was on the register. I have written to ask for this to be corrected but they haven't replied yet. Is this likely to be a major factor in the refusal for the bank account? Secondly the report made no mention of my HSBC bank account and credit card (even though I have over 3000 pounds credit limit on the card and an 1500 pound unused overdraft on my bank account). I rang HSBC and they told me they don't give details to Experian unless someone has a bad debt. They even told me I was an excellent customer! Is this a Catch-22 situation, and I won't even be able to get another bank account or get credit since I've never run into financial difficulties?

A: -It sounds like you have no Black data (bad financial info) and no white data (good financila data). Simply having a credit card or overdraft will not give you White data. you have to use them, ie borrow and pay back to get thje good white data recorded. -I opened a credit card account with cahoot a couple of years back. Their offer was open a card by the end of feb and we will reduce any balnces you transfer on by 10%. It was the first week in January when they made the offer and I applied. As I had a large balance I went for it. I am on the electoral roll and had been for over 5 years at my current address. After a number of weeks cahoot contacted me to say that I was not on the electoral roll!!! and that I was not listed on directory enquiries - totally untrue also. Anyway, I checked both, by requesting my file from equafax and ringing BT. I was on both and had been for the previous 5 years. I told cahoot this who continued to say that I was not. They asked me to send an original bill with my address on. This I did and they opened the account. However, the account opened JUST OUTSIDE of the offer period even though I had applied 2 months earlier. I complained, but they simply stuck to their guns insisting that I was not listed and that it was tough luck that I could not have the offer. As far as I am concerned it was a "marketing sharp practice" - promoting an offer that it is impossible to take advantage of. I hardly used the card and closed the account. -From what I understand about the way experian work they have a product called CAIS (Consumer Account something or other). This is based on a reciprocal agreement in that if you supply data to experian they will supply the same data to you. If you don't give them account balances, they don't show you account balances etc. The way an account is normally displayed from experian is something like this (only small part of the data): 011122321000 That shows twelve months worth of payments and shows in month one the customer was up to date, in month two they went one installment down, in month 5 they went 2 installments down, month seven they were 3 down in month 10 they paid their arrears and are now up to date. An experian search will then give the searching company a 'Worst' status in the last six months. I've gone slightly off track here, but I can;t see how HSBC cannot supply data to experian if they wish to credit check individuals as they have to supply data to receive it. The only thing I can think of is experian only receive default data (which is a code 8) from HSBC -Well, I wrote carefully to Cahoot (by email as they tell you to do that first), explaining that HSBC don't supply credit information, and telling them that I could provide evidence that I currently have a credit card and bank account, which I've had for 9 years. They wrote a simple reply back basically ignoring all the points I made in my letter, and saying if there's a problem with you Experian credit report I should write to Experian. They themselves won't credit score their customers, despite Experian have very incomplete information. I have little respect left for "a bank" who apply a blanket rule for every customer, with not allowance for circumstances. I hate to think how they might behave if I had to complain once I had an cahoot. I don't think I'll touch these people again. I might write a formal letter of complaint to their complaints department, but I don't know whether it's worth it if they have this sort of attitude. -experian are incompetent. I order my record on a regular basis, and credit agreements seem to appear and disappear by random. my last record was blank, didn't contain any credit accounts despite me having cc, mobile etc.

Discuss It!

Most Popular Articles

More

Marketplace

Related Articles

More

Related Categories

More

Recently Added

More

Other Great Sites