Consumer complaint received 2019-05-20
Company: EQUIFAX, INC.
State: OR
Product: Credit reporting, credit repair services, or other personal consumer reports
Sub-product: Credit reporting
Issue: Problem with fraud alerts or security freezes

Complaint:
Date/Time of Occurrence : XX/XX/XXXX, at approximately XXXX PST. 
What happened : When I attempted to electronically file my XXXX State and Federal income tax forms, I was initially unable to do so due to my wife and my credit reports having been previously locked by me. I contacted Equifax and had them unlocked ( or unfrozen ) and was then able to electronically transmit our XXXX Federal and State returns. 
Some time passed after my taxes were successfully received by the State and Federal authorities and on XX/XX/XXXX, I decided to lock my credit reports again. I attempted to do this via the Internet and the Equifax website but was unsuccessful. Part of my confusion had to do with Equifax having several different tools to lock and unlock or freeze and unfreeze our credit reports. And, I wasnt sure what I had originally used. I was not having success using the Internet to have them locked or frozen again. So, I decided to call Equifax customer service for assistance. I reached a male customer service rep and explained what I wanted to do. He asked to speak to my wife and I gave the phone to her. He asked her a series of questions to validate her identity and when he was certain of her identity, he accomplished the freeze or lock of her credit report. She then handed me the phone and when I attempted to speak with the Equifax employee, he had either hung up or the line was disconnected. 
I redialed the Equifax help number and was connected to another Equifax employee, this time a female with a foreign accent. I explained the situation and she proceeded to ask me a series of questions. I had trouble understanding her due to her accent but was able to get through her initial series of questions successfully. Finally, with one question that required more back-and-forth dialog, I had to keep asking her to slowly repeat herself because I was having a problem understanding her. I asked her to transfer me to a person who spoke English without an accent and she refused to do so, claiming that I had understood her previous questions. The question she kept asking me was a question that required more dialog between us and her accent made this more difficult for me to understand her. 
Her question was : Do you have any credit card accounts that were issued by a store. I answered that I had a XXXX credit card but I wasnt sure that it was what she wanted because the card not only could be used by me at XXXX but also anyplace else that accepted a VISA card. I understood her to ask what my monthly payments were for the card. Again this required back and forth dialog because I pay all my credit cards off to a XXXX balance each month and consequently my payment is never the same from month to month. So, I signed on to my XXXX account on the website and began to give her some monthly payment amounts for recent months. She seemed confused, or at least did not respond to my payment amounts, so further dialog with her once again made me realize that I needed to talk with somebody who spoke English without an accent. She refused and then she announced to me that she was locking my account and I would only be able to unlock it by mailing information to Equifax. I asked to speak to a supervisor and she would not comply with my wish. She insisted that mailing in the required identity information was the only way that my Equifax account would be available for me to deal with my account. 
So, at this time I am frustrated. I have two homes one in  XXXX and the other in XXXX. I am currently residing in my XXXX  home. The letter I must write to Equifax in order to allow me access to my credit report functions ( locking, freezing, etc. ) requires that I provide them a number of items to validate my identity including a photocopy of my birth certificate. I dont have a copy of my birth certificate at my XXXX location which is 950 miles away from where it resides in XXXX. Fortunately, I do have my U.S. Passport with me in XXXX which I will attempt to substitute for my birth certificate in my letter to Equifax. I dont know whether they will accept that in lieu of my birth certificate. And, I was told by another Equifax representative that this is the only way that I can restore my access to my credit report now that it has been locked by Equifax. 
Im sure you can not imagine how frustrated this makes me. I see this Equifax company receiving personal information from me and millions of others and with little regard for anybody but themselves, releasing it to unauthorized hackers. I have no choice in whether or not they have access to my information. Then they have the arrogance to offer a bunch of confusing tools to prevent me or anybody else from accessing my files some of which would require me to pay money to use others which are free but confusing to use which I suppose is intended to motivate me to pay for something which is required all because of their failure to properly do their job. 
Why not allow consumers to be able to select 3 out of, for example, 5 credit reporting companies to hold and manage their credit data. This would tend to weed out the incompetent companies like Equifax by denying the data to them. This would also motivate all of them to treat the publics very important data with a lot more consideration as to its security. 
I know the Consumer Protection Agency must be inundated with this kind of complaint ; I suspect particularly having to do with Equifax. I have taken a lot of my time to file this complaint and I hope that you can have some corrective influence with this rogue company. I will talk to my local congressman about my complaint as well. This is a classic catch-22 situation and deserves attention from the proper authorities. It wouldnt take many steps experienced by me to have prevented me from being able to transmit my income tax filings to the IRS and State agencies. 
Incidentally, I believe my calls to Equifax were recorded. If Equifax doesnt deny you access to it, you will find that I was respectful to their representatives. I think you will find it interesting. I dont blame the several Equifax agents that I spoke to. I do blame the problems, from the beginning, on the disregard by Equifax management, for the people whose data they collect and are entrusted to protect. 
Finally, I have no quarrel with Equifax attempting to validate that I was who I claimed to be. What I find incomprehensible is that they shut me down and diverted me into a process that required me to solve my identity problem by using services that demand slow resolution, i.e., the US Postal Services, etc. Yes, they did allow FAX transmittals, but when I asked about using email, that was denied. Not many individuals use or have easy access to FAX these days. The better and most efficient service would have been to provide me with an English-speaking individual who I could dialog with and clearly confirm the questions and answers related to my identity. So, if you are going to be in the very important credit reporting service industry, which can have serious negative results associated with processing delays in todays business functions, you should be certain that individuals involved in the very important identity function be able to clearly and effectively communicate with the American public. And if that requires that you have people who speak XXXX for Americans who communicate more comfortably in XXXXso be it, and make sure you give such folks access to those who can freely and effectively communicate in XXXX. At the very minimum, you should provide access to clear-speaking English agents if you are going to shut out English-speaking Americans from accessing their credit reporting functions.

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation