Credit Reporting Accuracy After a Legal Name Change Act of 2022
Bill: H.R.8478 | Sponsor: Rep. Pressley, Ayanna (D-MA)
Policy area: Finance and Financial Sector

Summary:
Credit Reporting Accuracy After a Legal Name Change Act of 2022
This bill prohibits, upon a consumer's request, a credit reporting agency from including on a consumer credit report a consumer's prior name after a legal name change.

To amend the Fair Credit Reporting Act to require nationwide consumer 
  reporting agencies, upon request, to use a consumer's current legal 
           name on consumer reports, and for other purposes.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Credit Reporting Accuracy After a 
Legal Name Change Act of 2022''.

SEC. 2. FINDINGS.

    Congress finds the following:
            (1) Consumer reports are significant to the ability for 
        American consumers to access credit, housing, and employment.
            (2) Fragmented files created by the credit reporting 
        industry lead to inaccuracies on the consumer reports of 
        transgender and gender nonconforming consumers after a legal 
        name change. Inaccurate consumer reports create additional 
        burdens and barriers for these consumers and impair their 
        ability to access credit, housing, and employment.
            (3) As of 2017, there were approximately 1.4 million adults 
        who identify as transgender, according to the Williams 
        Institute report, ``Age of Individuals Who Identify as 
        Transgender in the United States'', and as of 2021, 
        approximately 1.2 million adults identify as nonbinary, 
        according to the Williams Institute report, ``Nonbinary LGBTQ 
        Adults in the United States''.
            (4) As evidence that transgender and gender nonconforming 
        adults are vulnerable to discrimination, harassment, and abuse 
        based on their gender identity and expression, in its 2016 
        report ``Injustice at Every Turn'', the National Center for 
        Transgender Equality found that transgender adults experienced 
        unemployment at twice the rate of the general population, and 
        90 percent reported experiencing harassment, discrimination, or 
        mistreatment in the workplace. The report further found that 
        one in five transgender adults reported having been refused a 
        home or apartment because of their gender identity.
            (5) Transgender and gender nonconforming consumers face a 
        myriad of problems in terms of consumer reporting problems 
        after they change their names, including that their credit 
        report fragments into two or more unconnected files upon their 
        name change and that their name change and any credit actions 
        that follow are never reflected in their report at all. Many 
        consumers report that credit reporting problems have a negative 
        impact on their financial and personal lives, including credit 
        score decreases of 100 points or more, which can be a barrier 
        to accessing banking services, mortgages, auto financing, 
        employment, and rental housing.
            (6) Transgender consumers face severe adverse effects from 
        having their former name reflected on their credit report. The 
        disclosure of a transgender person's prior name in a consumer 
        report to a creditor, employer, or lessor can expose those 
        consumers to unlawful discrimination on the basis of that 
        consumer's gender identity.

SEC. 3. REQUIREMENT TO USE A CONSUMER'S CURRENT LEGAL NAME ON CONSUMER 
              REPORTS.

    Section 605(a) of the Fair Credit Reporting Act (15 U.S.C. 
1681c(a)) is amended by adding at the end the following:
            ``(9) With respect to a consumer reporting agency described 
        in section 603(p), any prior name of the consumer about whom 
        the report relates, other than the consumer's current legal 
        name, after receiving a request from the consumer to use only 
        the consumer's current legal name on all consumer reports.''.
                                 <all>