Consumer complaint received 2019-01-15
Company: EQUIFAX, INC.
State: OK
Product: Credit reporting, credit repair services, or other personal consumer reports
Sub-product: Credit reporting
Issue: Problem with a credit reporting company's investigation into an existing problem
Sub-issue: Their investigation did not fix an error on your report

Complaint:
I have taken every legal step required of me to dispute an item on my credit report. First, attempting to contact XXXX XXXX XXXX, the debt collector, to dispute this as totally inaccurate, which I was met with the most hateful attitude and hung up on. Then, attempting to dispute the item with XXXX XXXX XXXX 's " law firm '', which had me send them documentation showing proof that this is not valid. They simply responded by telling me that I didn't even know what the debt was about and was completely wrong and not to contact them ever again. Next, I continued on with disputing with all three credit bureaus, this was in XXXX-XX/XX/XXXX. Within two weeks of receiving my documentation, XXXX  removed this item, stating that it was clearly incorrect. Every single month since XX/XX/XXXX, I have fought and fought to have this removed from Equifax, including sending copies of official bank documents and a letter from the corporate offices of my bank stating that what was being claimed by the debt collector was completely false and not even possible. During this time, I have received several letters attempting to refuse to even investigate this matter, telling me that " they only have to investigate once, ever, and refused to do so again ''. I knew better and have called them out on their refusal to investigate, on multiple occasions. 
I have also had to hire an attorney to fight this false information. All correspondence from my lawyer to XXXX XXXX XXXX and XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX, have been ignored. 
My attorney, from XXXX of XXXX, Ok, have sent more than one letter to Equifax, the last being dated XX/XX/XXXX, with only one response, on XX/XX/XXXX. In this response Equifax stated " we will not be conducting further investigation into this particular account at this time ''. 
During the same period of time, my attorney had also disputed this same account with XXXX, whose initial response was that the account 's information was updated. 
Upon further inspection, I noticed that XXXX XXXX XXXX  had in fact updated information with regard to this file. When they could not validate this credit file, they falsified an account history with varied " Account Balance '' amounts, going through to XX/XX/XXXX, even though the supposed owed amount has always been the same " {$1000.00} '' and the debt collector first started this farce XX/XX/XXXX. The original creditor is an apartment complex, claiming rent was not paid, even though they were given proof from the bank, they turned this file over to the debt collector in XX/XX/XXXX. 
It has been obvious from the start that the debt collector is completely dishonest and does not care that this debt is totally bogus. From my experiences dealing with this, Equifax is just as dishonest, shady and simply doesn't care how badly they affect a person 's credit. Because this is the only negative item and over {$1000.00}, on my credit report, I have been denied credit, had to pay higher interest rates and much higher insurance rates. Equifax is clearly ignoring the dishonest behaviors of this debt collector and has zero good intentions with regard to others. 
I submitted a complaint about this item in XX/XX/XXXX to CFPB, with regard to XXXX  and as of XX/XX/XXXX, XXXX  has determined this item to not be credible and have removed it from my credit file. So, now XXXX and XXXX have both found XXXX XXXX XXXX to be non-credible and have deleted this item.

Company response to consumer: Closed with non-monetary relief