Consumer complaint received 2024-10-22 00:00:00
Product: Credit reporting or other personal consumer reports — Credit reporting
Issue: Unable to get your credit report or credit score — Problem getting your free annual credit report
Company: EQUIFAX, INC.
State: WA

Complaint narrative:
Okay, this is a lot to follow along with, because Equifax has been grossly negligent and I know for a fact that I'm not alone or even in a minority situation, because the XXXX XXXX XXXX  ( XXXX  ) is absolutely rife with a colossal number of similar complaints to mine, with Equifax refusing to be cooperative overall, and only giving in after we consumers vehemently push, fight, and claw at this horrible company until we finally get an employee that wants to do their job correctly and actually helps us. Don't take my word for it, just go look through the reviews and their low score of 1 out of 5 stars... 

1 ) About 3 months ago now, I submitted the paper form at XXXX and properly filled it out, asking that XXXX, Equifax, and XXXX all send a report back. Within two weeks I received my reports from XXXX and XXXX and there was no issues at all. Equifax however, just didn't even reply, not even a letter saying why. 

2 ) After about a month of no contact, I then filed a XXXX  complaint on Equifax, because this isn't the first time they have behaved this way. I send this form every 12 months and there's about a 50 % chance each year that one of the agencies refuses to cooperate, and then I have to jump through unnecessary hoops to get my free credit report, and it literally takes months with how slow these agencies move. 

3 ) After several weeks of back and forth in the XXXX  complaint, the Equifax employee behaved stupidly and literally would not act like a human at all. They just kept clicking the same predefined scripted response that had nothing to do with my situation, over and over again, never changing how they engaged me, even though I kept changing my responses and asked them to do the same. This royally XXXX me off, because it was clear that the employee was either being intentionally negligent or purposely petty, XXXX having a power trip. I asked XXXX  to close the complaint as unresolved due to the employee 's responses. 

4 ) Someone at Equifax has flagged my account as needing " More information to verify my identity '' and that was another point of contention that is definitely not being handled appropriately and needs outside intervention, for multiple reasons that all point back to gross negligence and/or petty and vindictive employees causing me grief, and I'll explain why... I know Equifax has already verified my identity multiple times, due to the fact that they often make me jump through hoops like this when I ask for a report, even though I haven't moved or made any major changes in my life for almost 10 years now. An employee or automated script at Equifax is inappropriately flagging my profile constantly as needing verification and it needs to stop now, as it is being used as a way to prevent me from obtaining my credit report ... Against my better judgement, I decided to do it again anyway and submit a 1 page printed letter that had text explaining how I've submitted this issue to the XXXX  and will be following up with the CFPB and every other agency I need to in order to solve this problem and stop these barriers from appearing in the future. I then added high quality pictures of my Driver License and Social Security Card, as well as printed text next that restates the same information. 

5 ) Equifax then has the nerve to blatantly ignore my letter which requested that someone at Equifax write me back explaining why these problems continue to exist and what they are going to do to solve them. There's objectively no reason I need to keep verifying my information, when in the exact same week both XXXX and XXXX had no issues whatsoever giving me my reports. What's clearly happening is the person who read my letter was being petty and then instead of responding to me like a human being and understanding that I have every right to be XXXX off over the withholding of my private information that I never gave Equifax permission to sell or manage, they proceeded to then send me a letter three weeks later saying my request was " illegible '' and I need to send it again, for the fourth time this year. 

6 ) My printed documents were not illegible and that's absolutely a lie by Equifax. There was also no need to verify my identity, so something suspect is going on at Equifax and a senior manager needs to get involved and look into firing some individuals that aren't doing their jobs properly. We also clearly need an outside agency to investigate this, because it is violating the Fair Credit Reporting Act, as these companies are flat out refusing to send us reports when they otherwise legally should and have no justifiable grounds for not following through. Like I have explained, the excuse of needing to verify identity has clearly become a way for Equifax and these companies to not participate, and anyone with business sense understands that the reason they do this is very clear too and isn't a secret -- it's because they push really hard for people to sign up on their website and make an account with the agencies directly to purchase a report and bypass all these hoops. In the end, it's about money and corruption, and that's why CFPB and other government agencies need to get involved. 

Again, please don't just take my word for it, go and really look through all the complaints about the credit agencies on XXXX, it will be an eye opener. Also, if you've never gone through the process yourself, please take the time to do exactly what I did, and simply fill out the paper form from XXXX, mail it, wait forever for a response, and then if all three agencies do happen to actually get back to you, see how much information is flat out wrong on your report and then take the time to actually call them and fix it ( trust me, don't write them and don't use their website, it only makes this take longer and has more hoops to jump through ), and tell them everything they need to delete. I highly doubt you can get through this process as a whole without pulling your hair out, and then we will be in the same boat emotionally. 

This is actually a really huge problem, and it's time for the United States Government to step in and fix it, as there are clearly a truckload of us with the same or similar issues.

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation