Consumer complaint received 2025-03-18 00:00:00
Product: Credit reporting or other personal consumer reports — Credit reporting
Issue: Problem with a company's investigation into an existing problem — Their investigation did not fix an error on your report
Company: National Consumer Telecom & Utilities Exchange, Inc.
State: UT

Complaint narrative:
I'm a victim of identity theft where my identity such as social security number, name, date of birth, and so on were stolen from some of the recent security breaches, such as XXXX breach, and XXXX XXXX data breach. 
On XX/XX/XXXX, some fraudster used my identity to open a credit line with XXXX XXXX ( XXXX  ) retailer, and placed some fraudulent orders. 

During the process XXXX  initiated a hard inquiry into my credit report from XXXX and NCTUE ( also owned by XXXX ). 
I did not get any notification for this attempt from neither of them. 
On XX/XX/XXXX, I got a bill from XXXX, which I followed up right away with their customer service. 
Once their customer service realized that the account and order was fraudulent, the account was placed in fraud alert. 

I worked with their customer service to provide notarized FTC 's identity theft report. 
I also filled police report with XXXX XXXX XXXX police department. 
While XXXX  doing their investigation, I froze my credit report at all XXXX credit bureaus, and also enabled fraud alert. 

While checking my credit report from all credit bureaus, I noticed at my NCTUE credit report that there was a hard pull on XX/XX/XXXX by XXXX, XXXX XXXX XXXX, XXXX XXXX  XXXX, with phone # XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX  XXXX is the corporate address XXXX XXXX XXXX On XX/XX/XXXX, I sent a notarized letter following fcra XXXX XXXX from XXXX, to block the fraudulent hard pull to NCTUE. 
Along with this, I also attached FTC identity theft report, XXXX XXXX XXXX Police Report, and copy of my driver license. 

Meanwhile, on XX/XX/XXXX, I got a letter ( attached ), from XXXX  saying : 1. that they have completed their investigation, and 2. they concurred that the account was opened fraudulently, and 3. they have closed this fraudulent account, and 4. They will ask Credit Bureaus to remove all reference for this account. 

On XX/XX/XXXX, I received a letter from NCTUE, refusing to block the hard pull information, with reason " Inquiries are a factual record of file access. 
If you have reason to believe this inquiry is fraudulent, please contact your service provider directly and follow their internal fraud procedures. '' This refusal answer from XXXX is totally non sense, and they should be fined by authority for breaking FCRA section 605B.

The FCRA section 605B are very clear as follow : ( a ) Block. Except as otherwise provided in this section, a consumer reporting agency shall block the reporting of any information in the file of a consumer that the consumer identifies as information that resulted from an alleged identity theft, not later than 4 business days after the date of receipt by such agency of ( 1 ) appropriate proof of the identity of the consumer ; ( 2 ) a copy of an identity theft report ; ( 3 ) the identification of such information by the consumer; and ( 4 ) a statement by the consumer that the information is not information relating to any transaction by the consumer. 
( b ) Notification. A consumer reporting agency shall promptly notify the furnisher of information identified by the consumer under subsection ( a ) of this section ( 1 ) that the information may be a result of identity theft ; ( 2 ) that an identity theft report has been filed ; ( 3 ) that a block has been requested under this section; and ( 4 ) of the effective dates of the block.

Note that the FCRA says " INFORMATION ''. Credit hard pull entry in someone credit report IS by definition " INFORMATION '' The fact that NCTUE refused to do anything even after have been served by FCRA section 605B letter, is a gross misconduct against the FCRA law. 
Also the fact that XXXX ( parent company of NCTUE ) thru their mismanagement, caused the massive XXXX data breach, which could cause my identity theft issue does not help at all. 

This egregious behavior from XXXX for NOT conducting proper investigations of consumer dispute is well known, and have caused them to be fined by CFPB on XX/XX/XXXX. Apparently this behavior still remains, 3 months later, after XXXX has been fined.

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation