Consumer complaint received 2015-04-18
Product: Credit reporting — 
Issue: Credit reporting company's investigation — No notice of investigation status/result
Company: EQUIFAX, INC. (AL)

I immigrated to the United States in XX/XX/XXXX. I am a lawful permanent resident with a XXXX XXXX. During XXXX season of XX/XX/XXXX I purchased some items from XXXX XXXX in XXXX Florida. I have enough money to buy things, but the ladies at the counter informed me, " If you open a XXXX XXXX card, you will get 15 % discount ''. I applied for the card on the spot in order to avail of the discount. In their application form they insisted I give the street address. At my street address there was no mail box. We used a PO box in the same city. I informed the clerks that no mail comes to our residence address because we do not have a mail box on the property but we have a PO box . The clerks informed me that I needed to enter my street address, so I did that. XXXX XXXX sent me the card and statement, presumably to the street address, so they were obviously returned to them by the post office. XXXX months later I get a phone call from XXXX XXXX informing me I had to pay the bill and a fine for late payment. I informed them I was willing to pay for the goods I purchased, but not the fine because it was not my fault that I had not got the bill/card/statement. I then went to the store in XXXX Florida where I had purchased the goods. I paid for the goods using my XXXX, credit card, spoke to the manager/clerks there, explained to them that I did not need any credit from XXXX XXXX because I have enough money. I had only applied for their card because their clerks had cheerfully informed me about the 15 % discount if I applied for XXXX XXXX card. I explained in detail about not having a mail box on my property. I talked to the manager/clerks as well as the XXXX XXXX person who they had dialed. I asked the XXXX XXXX representative who was on the phone, " I am paying only for the goods I had bought, I want you to take that penalty off and confirm it is done. I just made payment right now at this store as we are talking ''. He/she who was on the phone informed me " Yes I have taken your penalty amount off in view of what you have told me ''. " Please confirm that I owe NOTHING to you now ''. He/she who was on the phone said, " Yes the balance shows as XXXX ''. To my surprise, a few months later I get another phone call from XXXX XXXX, asking me to pay the penalty. For the XXXX time I explained the entire situation to them. Few weeks later I got another letter from XXXX XXXX demanding me to pay up. I sent them a letter explaining for the XXXX time. I then got a letter from a debt collection company, then I kept getting letters and phone calls from debt collection companies. I was new to the United States and did not know that XXXX XXXX had the power to ruin my " credit score '' because I did not know there was such a thing as " credit score ''. My wife had advised me, " Best pay what they want '' but I thought because I had done no wrong, and XXXX XXXX had done something wrong, nothing bad would happen to me. I was surprised to learn that I had something called " credit score '' and it was a XXXX score because XXXX XXXX had reported " non-payment '' of dues, or something like that. 
I wanted to sue them but I was just a XXXX and did not have the money to sue them. I realized that though I had recourse to a court of law and could sue XXXX XXXX ; I could not do anything because I did not have the money to pay a lawyer 's fees. The only lawyer I contacted asked me for {$5000.00} for starters. I did not have even {$500.00} to give him, so I learned not to apply for any store credit cards like XXXX XXXX. The damage XXXX XXXX did to me was unjust but they got away with it because I do not have money to sue them. I guess they know that we are too XXXX to sue them, so they use this ruse to rake in money. If they can siphon off {$100.00} from XXXX XXXX XXXX people like me by unjust threats and by attacking our credit scores, they will be richer by {$100.00} XXXX. 
XXXX XXXX Account No : XXXX