Good Thing Credit Is Easy to Get These Days

[lawnrrd]

I got home tonight to a message on my answering machine from American Express. The message directed me to call a number, and, when I did, I was told that a limit was being placed on my account. When I asked why, the woman told me that I had had too many delinquencies and new accounts. When I mentioned that I had no delinquencies and that the only account I had opened in at least the past three years was to buy our car, she told me to take it up with Experian. So I did.

My credit records, it seems, have been combined with those of someone who lives upstate and has a name similar to mine. The facts that this guy (1) is as old as my mother and (2) has a different social security from mine seem not to have been considered relevant.

I can't fix this until tomorrow. Fortunately, I have nothing important to do—I mean, besides my job, of course. And I'm sure that TransUnion and Equifax are equally screwed up, but I can't think about that right now.

Comments

[viviane212.livejournal.com]

Ack, that sucks. You could pull your credit reports via Annual Credit Report:

https://www.annualcreditreport.com/cra/index.jsp

[malixe.livejournal.com]

Yeah. For all the importance they place on the information, they're haphazard and incompetent about gathering and managing it.

I co-signed on a motorcycle loan for a very close friend (my informally adopted son, basically). He made most of the payments, and then by mutual agreement, I took over the motorcycle and the payments until it was paid off. (Due to health issues he wasn't able to ride it, and I was feeling a need for a back-up form of transportation, so it worked out fine for both of us.)

Couple years later I'm checking my credit reports for the first time through the free credit report site, and I find that -two- of the big three have me listed as living at a couple of addresses I didn't recognize. I momentarily freaked, thinking my identity must have been stolen, then I looked harder and realized that they were -his- former residences.

So by co-signing on the loan, somehow we became co-residents at the same time, according to everyone but TransUnion anyway.

Stupid fucks.

[katestine.livejournal.com]

Sorry to hear that. Hope you get this cleared up as painlessly as possible.