Consumer complaint received 2021-05-04
Company: EQUIFAX, INC.
State: CA
Product: Credit reporting, credit repair services, or other personal consumer reports
Sub-product: Credit reporting
Issue: Incorrect information on your report
Sub-issue: Account status incorrect

Complaint:
On XX/XX/XXXX, my wife XXXX XXXX purchased a XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX  from XXXX, a national Internet-based car dealership. I was cosigner. We put down {$10000.00} and financed about {$24000.00} with a loan from XXXX XXXX XXXX. The transaction occurred at our home ; XXXX brings you the car, lets you drive it, and then sells it to you. The entire loan transaction was conducted on XXXX XXXX tablet computer at our home. XXXX  sells cars with a seven-day period to try the car, and the purchase can be cancelled and the car returned during that period. On XX/XX/XXXX, I took the car to be inspected by a mechanic and the car failed virtually every test of the engine. It also turned out that a body problem, a broken molding, was going to cost over {$1800.00} to repair because the part was no longer readily available. We returned the car on XX/XX/XXXX, and XXXX  agreed in writing to have the XXXX loan " cancelled. '' We waited. On XX/XX/XXXX, XXXX reported the " new loan '' to all three credit reporting agencies, without ascertaining whether the transaction had been cancelled during the seven-day cancellation period. Shift didn't pay off the loan until XX/XX/XXXX, after I had received a notice from XXXX that our first payment was due on XX/XX/XXXX and had called a number of times to complain, and XXXX didn't have the loan " cancelled. '' XXXX  confirmed in a letter that the loan had been paid off on XX/XX/XXXX, though it didn't say the loan was " cancelled. '' Again we waited for the cancellation, or at least the payoff, of the loan to be reported to the credit reporting agencies. That didn't happen. I called XXXX on XX/XX/XXXX to verify that the loan had been paid. A Customer Support representative who said her name was " XXXX '' confirmed that it had been paid. I asked whether this had been reported to the credit reporting agencies. She said that the only way to do that was for me to submit a " dispute '' to XXXX XXXX " Credit Investigations Department, '' and she said they only had two people in that department, one of whom she said was named XXXX XXXX. I asked why I had to submit a dispute when XXXX acknowledged the loan had been paid off. She hung up the phone. I then wrote a letter to XXXX XXXX Credit Investigations Department demanding that they notify the credit bureaus that the loan had been paid off. The letter is attached. I never received any response. Meanwhile, my wife XXXX and I were in the process of applying for a loan to refinance our house. We waited and waited for the loan payoff to show up on our credit reports. As of XX/XX/XXXX, almost a month since the loan was paid off, the " new loan '' still is on our credit reports with no indication it has been paid off. In fact, on XXXX  there is a notation that we made the first payment (! ), nothing about the loan being paid in full. My credit has been adversely affected, my credit score has gone down, at a critical time when we are trying to get a refinance loan. I tried calling XXXX during the week ending XX/XX/XXXX and was told there was nothing they could do, that they " would have '' sent a notification to the credit bureaus on either the XXXX or XXXX of the month. She was not able to offer any record showing that this had been done, but she blamed the credit reporting agencies for being slow to post this to our credit reports. I tried to submit a dispute on Equifax 's website today, and found that there was no way to dispute the existence of the XXXX loan, I was asked to select the type of dispute and there was no type listed that matched ours, and I had to select a month in which the dispute arose and it wouldn't allow me to check XXXX as the month. I haven't yet tried to submit the dispute on XXXX  's and XXXX XXXX websites but I will. I have the letter from XXXX acknowledging the payoff, it is dated XX/XX/XXXX and says, " Thank you for being a XXXX XXXX XXXX customer. We value your business and it's our pleasure to let you know your account was paid in full on XX/XX/XXXX. Congratulations! '' It is attached. One other thing : we authorized XXXX to check our credit, but the XXXX " concierge '' ( their word for a salesman, whose name was XXXX XXXX, told us it wouldn't affect our credit, they wouldn't make a " hard '' inquiry. Instead, they apparently contacted several lenders, all of which made " hard '' inquiries of our credit without our ever having authorized them to do so. This, too, hurt our credit because those inquiries show up on some of our credit reports. What we want : We want all reference to the XXXX loan  deleted from our credit reports, and we want all credit inquiries made on XX/XX/XXXX deleted from our credit reports. We should be put into the same position we would have been in had none of this happened.

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation