Court Opinion

ID: 9963209
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2024-04-24 19:01:11.922414+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T08:24:42.549640
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USCA11 Case: 22-11014   Document: 69-1    Date Filed: 04/24/2024   Page: 1 of 18

                                                           [PUBLISH]
                                 In the
                 United States Court of Appeals
                        For the Eleventh Circuit

                         ____________________

                               No. 22-11014
                         ____________________

        TANETHIA HOLDEN,
        an individual,
                                                    Plaintiﬀ-Appellant,
        versus
        HOLIDAY INN CLUB VACATIONS INCORPORATED,
        a foreign for-proﬁt corporation,
        f.k.a. Orange Lake Country Club, Inc.,

                                                  Defendant-Appellee,

        EXPERIAN INFORMATION SOLUTIONS, INC.
        a foreign for-proﬁt corporation,
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        2                   Opinion of the Court                22-11014

                                                            Defendant.

                          ____________________

                 Appeal from the United States District Court
                      for the Middle District of Florida
                  D.C. Docket No. 6:19-cv-02373-CEM-EJK
                          ____________________

                          ____________________

                                No. 22-11734
                          ____________________

        MARK S. MAYER,
        an individual,
                                                     Plaintiﬀ-Appellant,
        versus
        HOLIDAY INN CLUB VACATIONS INCORPORATED,
        a foreign for-proﬁt corporation f.k.a. Orange Lake
        Country Club, Inc.,

                                                   Defendant-Appellee,
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        22-11014              Opinion of the Court                        3

        EXPERIAN INFORMATION SOLUTIONS, INC.,
        a foreign for-proﬁt corporation,

                                                                Defendant.

                            ____________________

                   Appeal from the United States District Court
                        for the Middle District of Florida
                    D.C. Docket No. 6:20-cv-02283-GAP-EJK
                            ____________________

        Before BRANCH, LUCK, and TJOFLAT, Circuit Judges.
        TJOFLAT, Circuit Judge:
               Our country’s credit reporting system relies on accurate re-
        porting both by consumer reporting agencies and entities, known
        as furnishers, that provide information to those agencies about con-
        sumers’ debts. Under the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA),
        15 U.S.C. § 1681s-2, furnishers must conduct a reasonable investi-
        gation when a consumer challenges the accuracy of the infor-
        mation.
              In this consolidated appeal, we face the question of what
        amounts to an actionable inaccuracy under the FCRA. Two con-
        sumers, Tanethia Holden and Mark Mayer, entered into purchase
        agreements for timeshares with Holiday Inn Club Vacations Inc.
        Holden and Mayer stopped making monthly payments and
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        4                         Opinion of the Court                       22-11014

        considered their agreements to be canceled. Holiday disagreed and
        reported their debts to Experian—a consumer reporting agency.
        After unsuccessful attempts to resolve their disputes with Holiday, 1
        Holden and Mayer filed individual FCRA actions alleging that Hol-
        iday violated § 1681s-2 by inaccurately reporting that they owed
        debts and that Holiday failed to reasonably investigate their dis-
        putes. The District Courts granted summary judgment for Holiday
        in both cases, finding the alleged inaccuracies were legal disputes
        and therefore not actionable under § 1681s-2.
                After careful review, and with the benefit of oral argument,
        we affirm—though for a different reason. Whether the alleged in-
        accuracy is factual or legal is beside the point. Instead, what mat-
        ters is whether the alleged inaccuracy was objectively and readily
        verifiable. Here it was not. Thus, Mayer and Holden had no ac-
        tionable FCRA claims.
                                      I. Background
              Holiday is a timeshare company. Its customers pay to use
        one or more of its vacation properties for a few weeks per year.
        Holiday’s customers also agree to pay homeowner association
        dues that cover maintenance and property taxes. Like many of
        Holiday’s customers, Holden and Mayer financed their timeshares

        1 Holden and Mayer also claimed that Experian violated the FCRA by failing

        to ensure that their credit reports were accurate. Those claims are not at issue
        because Holden and Mayer settled and dismissed their claims against Ex-
        perian.
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        22-11014                  Opinion of the Court                                5

        through Holiday. 2 Because their cases differ slightly, we recap the
        rest of Holden’s and Mayer’s cases individually.
                                      A. Holden’s Case
              On June 25, 2016, Holden entered into a purchase agree-
        ment with Holiday to buy a timeshare in Las Vegas. The same day,
        Holden obtained a promissory note to finance most of the pur-
        chase. The note required Holden to make 120 monthly payments.
        Also on the same day, Holden executed a mortgage securing pay-
        ment of the note.
               Among other conditions, the closing and title provision of
        the purchase agreement stated that the transaction would not close
        until Holden made the first three monthly payments and Holiday
        recorded the declaration in Holden’s name. The purchase agree-
        ment also included a purchaser’s default provision.3 That provision
        stated, “[u]pon [Holden’s] default or breach of any term or condi-
        tion of this Agreement, all sums paid hereunder by [Holden] shall
        be retained by [Holiday] as liquidated damages, not as a penalty,
        and the parties hereto shall be relieved from all obligations

        2 Technically, Holden and Mayer financed their timeshares through Wilson

        Resort Finance, LLC. However, as the District Court in Holden’s case noted,
        the parties treat Holiday and Wilson as the same entity.
        3 The parties and the District Courts sometimes refer to the purchaser’s default

        provision as the “liquidated damages provision,” “liquidation provision,” or
        “liquidation clause.” We use “purchaser’s default provision” since that is how
        it appears in the purchase agreements.
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        6                     Opinion of the Court                22-11014

        hereunder.” The agreement also said that “[a]ny Note Payments
        made by [Holden] prior to closing shall be subject to the default
        provisions.”
               After making her third payment, Holden defaulted and hired
        an attorney. On March 9, 2017, Holden’s attorney notified Holiday
        that Holden “no longer intend[ed] to make further payments” be-
        cause “she allege[d] her sales transaction was fraudulently repre-
        sented at the time of sale and/or another reason exist[ed] for non-
        payment, such as [her] inability to continue to fund the purchase.”
        Two weeks later, Holden’s attorney sent another letter. In the sec-
        ond letter, Holden tried to cancel the agreement citing language
        from the closing and purchaser’s default provisions.
               Holiday disagreed that the agreement was canceled. On
        June 19, 2017, it recorded the timeshare deed. It also reported the
        delinquent debt to Experian. In response, Holden’s attorney sent
        three dispute letters to Holiday. Holiday investigated the dispute
        but determined that its reporting was accurate because it con-
        cluded that Holden was still obligated under the note.
               Holden then sued Holiday alleging various violations of
        Florida law and the FCRA. Pertinent here is Count IV of Holden’s
        complaint. Under Count IV, Holden claimed that Holiday re-
        ported inaccurate information to Experian, failed to conduct an ap-
        propriate investigation, and failed to correct the inaccuracies—all
        of which were required under the FCRA. The parties later cross-
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        22-11014                Opinion of the Court                           7

        moved for partial summary judgment on Count IV—the only re-
        maining claim against Holiday.4
             The District Court granted Holiday’s motion and denied
        Holden’s. The court reasoned that
               a plaintiff asserting a claim against a furnisher for fail-
               ure to conduct a reasonable investigation cannot pre-
               vail on the claim without demonstrating that had the
               furnisher conducted a reasonable investigation, the
               result would have been different; i.e., that the fur-
               nisher would have discovered that the information it
               reported was inaccurate or incomplete.
        Holden      v.     Holiday      Inn     Club      Vacations     Inc.,
        No. 6:19-cv-2373-CEM-EJK, 2022 WL 993572, at *2 (M.D. Fla. Feb.
        28, 2022) (quoting Felts v. Wells Fargo Bank, N.A., 893 F.3d 1305,
        1313 (11th Cir. 2018)). And citing our unpublished opinion in Bat-
        terman v. BR Carroll Glenridge, LLC, 829 F. App’x 478, 481–82 (11th
        Cir. 2020), it reasoned that “[g]enerally, unresolved contract dis-
        putes constitute legal disputes and not factual inaccuracies.” Id. at
        *3. Because there remained a legal dispute on whether Holden still
        owed a debt, the court found that Holden’s FCRA claim must fail.
        Holden timely appealed.

        4 Holiday offered judgment on Holden’s other claims under Federal Rule of

        Civil Procedure 68, which Holden accepted. On June 22, 2020, the District
        Court entered judgment for Holden on those claims.
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        8                       Opinion of the Court                   22-11014

                                    B. Mayer’s Case
               On September 15, 2014, Mayer entered into a purchase
        agreement to buy a timeshare with Holiday in Cape Canaveral.
        That purchase agreement contained nearly identical closing and
        default provisions as Holden’s agreement. Like Holden, Mayer ex-
        ecuted a promissory note to finance the purchase. Under the note’s
        terms, he too was required to make 120 monthly payments.
                On July 13, 2015, Holiday recorded the deed in Mayer’s
        name. Meanwhile, Mayer made timely monthly payments until
        May 2017. 5 When Mayer stopped making payments, Holiday re-
        ported the delinquency to Experian. Around August 17, 2019,
        Mayer obtained a copy of his credit report from Experian where he
        learned that Holiday had reported a past-due balance. In response,
        Mayer sent multiple letters to Experian disputing the debt because
        he believed the agreement was terminated under the default pro-
        vision. Experian communicated each dispute to Holiday, who cer-
        tified that the information was accurate.
                Mayer then sued Holiday. In his sole count against Holiday,
        Mayer alleged that Holiday violated 15 U.S.C. § 1681s-2(b) of the
        FCRA because Holiday furnished inaccurate information and failed
        to “fully and properly re-investigate” the disputes. In turn, Holiday
        moved to dismiss, and the District Court partially granted

        5 Mayer made a partial monthly payment in June 2017, but he made his last

        full monthly payment in May 2017.
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        22-11014                  Opinion of the Court                              9

        Holiday’s motion.6 In permitting Mayer’s claims to proceed, the
        District Court read our decision in Losch v. Nationstar Mortgage LLC,
        995 F.3d 937 (11th Cir. 2021), to mean that a disputed legal issue
        can change into an undisputed fact. Mayer v. Holiday Inn Club Vaca-
        tions Inc., No. 6:20-cv-2283-GAP-EJK, 2021 WL 2942654, at *3
        (M.D. Fla. June 8, 2021). Given that Mayer cited two other cases
        in which courts ruled against Holiday in nearly identical circum-
        stances, the District Court found that Mayer had “raised a merito-
        rious factual dispute as to the accuracy of his credit report.” Id.
        Holiday then moved for partial summary judgment as to Count I.
               As in Holden’s case, the District Court also granted Holi-
        day’s motion. The court noted that although it permitted Mayer’s
        claims to proceed under Losch’s rationale, it now faced a different
        picture. Though Mayer had cited two unfavorable decisions to
        Holiday, Holiday presented “a string of cases where courts ha[d]
        sided with its interpretation of the contract” that the default provi-
        sion did not excuse Mayer’s obligation to keep paying. The court
        found that the “conflicting outcomes in these cases only serve[d] to
        emphasize that the underlying issue here [was] a legal dispute, not
        a factual one.” Relying on Batterman, the court therefore found
        that Mayer’s claim was not actionable under the FCRA. Mayer
        timely appealed.

        6 The District Court dismissed Mayer’s claims as they related to factual inac-

        curacies with payments he made in 2016 because he failed to allege that he
        disputed the accuracy of those payments with Experian.
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        10                      Opinion of the Court                   22-11014

                                 II. Legal Standards
               “We review grants of summary judgment de novo.” Mil-
        gram v. Chase Bank USA, N.A., 72 F.4th 1212, 1217 (11th Cir. 2023)
        (per curiam). “Summary judgment is proper ‘if the movant shows
        that there is no genuine dispute as to any material fact and the mo-
        vant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.’” Id. (quoting Brown
        v. Nexus Bus. Sols., LLC, 29 F.4th 1315, 1317 (11th Cir. 2022)); see also
        Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(a). “On summary-judgment review, we view all
        evidence in ‘the light most favorable to the nonmoving party’ and
        draw ‘all justifiable inferences in that party’s favor.’” Milgram,
        72 F.4th at 1217 (quoting Brown, 29 F.4th at 1317). “Likewise, we
        exercise de novo review over questions of statutory interpreta-
        tion.” Pinares v. United Techs. Corp., 973 F.3d 1254, 1259 (11th Cir.
        2020).
                                   III. Discussion
               On appeal, Holden and Mayer argue that the District Courts
        erred in finding that FCRA claims based on legal disputes—such as
        theirs—are not actionable. They contend that the District Courts’
        interpretation of the FCRA conflicts with the statute’s text, struc-
        ture, and purposes. According to Holden and Mayer, the FCRA
        does not distinguish between factual and legal disputes.
               Holiday asserts that disputed legal issues based on consumer
        allegations—like contractual interpretations that have not been re-
        solved by a court—are not actionable under the FCRA. It explains
        that the existence of a legal conclusion about the invalidity of the
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        22-11014              Opinion of the Court                       11

        debt is a necessary condition precedent to an FCRA claim of this
        type.
               Neither party has it right, though we agree with Holiday
        that Holden’s and Mayer’s claims are not actionable. We split our
        discussion into two parts. First, we describe how the FCRA oper-
        ates. And second, we explain why no FCRA claims exist here.
                          A. The Fair Credit Reporting Act
                “Congress enacted the [FCRA] to protect consumers from
        unfair reporting methods while also ensuring that the credit system
        would retain the accuracy required by the banking system to effi-
        ciently allocate credit.”        Milgram, 72 F.4th at 1217;
        see 15 U.S.C. § 1681. The FCRA imposes two duties on furnishers.
        First, “furnishers have a duty not to furnish information about a
        consumer to a reporting agency if the furnisher ‘knows or has rea-
        sonable cause to believe’ that the information is inaccurate.” Mil-
        gram, 72 F.4th at 1217 (quoting 15 U.S.C. § 1681s-2(a)(1)(A)). Sec-
        ond, furnishers must take certain actions once notified that a con-
        sumer disputes the accuracy or completeness of his or her fur-
        nished information. 15 U.S.C. § 1681s-2(b).
                “Consumers can dispute the accuracy of the information in
        their credit reports in one of two ways.” Milgram, 72 F.4th at 1217.
        Consumers may either dispute the information “(1) directly with
        the furnisher or (2) indirectly with the credit reporting agency.”
        Id.; see also 15 U.S.C. § 1681s-2(a)(8) (directing the CFPB to prom-
        ulgate regulations for direct disputes); 12 C.F.R. § 1022.43
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        12                      Opinion of the Court                  22-11014

        (regulations related to direct disputes); 15 U.S.C. § 1681i(a)(2) (re-
        lating to indirect disputes).
               When a furnisher is notified of such a dispute, “the furnisher
        must (1) conduct an investigation with respect to the disputed in-
        formation; (2) review all relevant information provided by the
        [consumer reporting agency]; and (3) report the results of the in-
        vestigation to the [consumer reporting agency].” Felts, 893 F.3d at
        1312; 15 U.S.C. § 1681s-2(b)(1). “If the furnisher finds, following an
        investigation, that an item of information disputed by a consumer
        is incomplete, inaccurate, or cannot be verified, the furnisher must
        either modify, delete, or permanently block reporting of that infor-
        mation.” Felts, 893 F.3d at 1312; 15 U.S.C. § 1681s-2(b)(1)(E). And,
        “with respect to information the furnisher finds to be inaccurate or
        incomplete, the furnisher also must report those results to all other
        [consumer reporting agencies].” Felts, 893 F.3d at 1312; 15 U.S.C.
        § 1681s-2(b)(1)(D).
               “Consumers have no private right of action against furnish-
        ers for reporting inaccurate information to [consumer reporting
        agencies] regarding consumer accounts. Instead, the only private
        right of action consumers have against furnishers is for a violation
        of § 1681s-2(b) . . . .” Felts, 893 F.3d at 1312 (citing 15 U.S.C.
        § 1681s-2(c)(1)).
         B. The Alleged Inaccuracies Are Not Objectively and Readily Verifiable
              With that framework in mind, we now explain why
        Holden’s and Mayer’s FCRA claims are not actionable. “To suc-
        ceed on an FCRA claim, a plaintiff must establish (at least) two
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        22-11014                  Opinion of the Court                               13

        things.” Milgram, 72 F.4th at 1218. First, a plaintiff must “identify[]
        inaccurate or incomplete information that the furnisher provided
        to the reporting agency.” Id. “And second, to prove an investiga-
        tion was unreasonable, a plaintiff must point out ‘some facts the
        furnisher could have uncovered that establish that the reported in-
        formation was, in fact, inaccurate or incomplete.’” Id. (emphasis
        omitted) (quoting Felts, 893 F.3d at 1313). Because Holden and
        Mayer cannot identify inaccurate or incomplete information that
        Holiday provided to the consumer reporting agencies, they cannot
        prevail. 7
               This case turns on the meaning of “accuracy” in the FCRA.
        As we have explained, the FCRA “requires ‘maximum possible ac-
        curacy.’” Erickson v. First Advantage Background Servs. Corp.,
        981 F.3d 1246, 1251 (11th Cir. 2020). “The words ‘maximum’ and
        ‘possible’ mean ‘greatest in quantity or highest in degree attainable’
        and ‘falling or lying within the powers’ of an agent or activity.” Id.

        7 To be clear, Holden and Mayer do not argue in their briefs before us that the

        information Holiday reported was incomplete. At best, they make a passing
        reference that the “question before the district court on summary judgment
        should have been whether the plaintiffs demonstrated that Holiday . . . fur-
        nished inaccurate or incomplete information.” Plaintiffs-Appellants’ Consoli-
        dated Opening Br. at 29, Holden v. Holiday Inn Club Vacations Inc., No. 22-11014
        (11th Cir Dec. 9, 2022), 2022 WL 17843086, at *29. “Merely making passing
        references to a claim . . . is insufficient. Instead, the party must clearly and
        unambiguously demarcate the specific claim and devote a discrete section of
        his argument to it so the court may properly consider it.” Brown v. United
        States, 720 F.3d 1316, 1332 (11th Cir. 2013) (citation omitted). Holden and
        Mayer have therefore forfeited any argument that the information was incom-
        plete.
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        14                         Opinion of the Court                     22-11014

        (first quoting Maximum, Webster’s Third New International Dictionary
        (3d ed. 1961); and then quoting Possible, Webster’s Third New Inter-
        national Dictionary (3d ed. 1961)). “‘Accuracy,’ in turn, means ‘free-
        dom from mistake or error.’ And being free from ‘mistake’ or ‘er-
        ror’ means being free from ‘a misunderstanding of the meaning or
        implication of something’ and not deviating from ‘truth or accu-
        racy.’” Id. at 1251–52 (first quoting Accuracy, Webster’s Third New
        International Dictionary (3d ed. 1961); then quoting Mistake, Web-
        ster’s Third New International Dictionary (3d ed. 1961); and then quot-
        ing Error, Webster’s Third New International Dictionary (3d ed. 1961))
        (other citations omitted). 8
                We have also stated that “when evaluating whether a report
        is accurate under the [FCRA], we look to the objectively reasonable
        interpretations of the report.” Id. at 1252. Putting this altogether,
        “a report must be factually incorrect, objectively likely to mislead
        its intended user, or both to violate the maximal accuracy standard
        of the [FCRA].” Id.; see also Sessa v. Trans Union, LLC, 74 F.4th 38,
        40 (2d Cir. 2023) (“[A]n FCRA claim alleges an ‘inaccuracy’ so long

        8 12 C.F.R. § 1022.41(a) also defines “accuracy” as

                meanin[ing] that information that a furnisher provide[d] to a
                consumer reporting agency about an account or other rela-
                tionship with the consumer correctly:
                    (1) Reflect[ed] the terms of and liability for the account or other
                        relationship;
                    (2) Reflect[ed] the consumer’s performance and other conduct
                        with respect to the account or other relationship; and
                    (3) Identifie[d] the appropriate consumer.
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        22-11014               Opinion of the Court                        15

        as the challenged information is objectively and readily verifia-
        ble.”).
                The problem for Holden and Mayer is that the alleged inac-
        curate information is not objectively and readily verifiable because
        it stems from a contractual dispute without a straightforward an-
        swer. It may be true, as some of our sister circuits have reasoned,
        that “the furnisher of credit information stands in a far better posi-
        tion to make a thorough investigation of a disputed debt than [a
        consumer reporting agency] does.” Gorman v. Wolpoff & Abramson,
        LLP, 584 F.3d 1147, 1156 (9th Cir. 2009); accord Mader v. Experian
        Info. Sols., Inc., 56 F.4th 264, 271 (2d Cir. 2023). If so, that would
        mean that the FCRA “will sometimes require furnishers to investi-
        gate, and even to highlight or resolve, questions of legal signifi-
        cance.” Gross v. CitiMortgage, Inc., 33 F.4th 1246, 1253 (9th Cir.
        2022). And we agree that “furnishers are qualified and obligated to
        assess issues such as whether debts are actually due and/or are col-
        lectible,” as the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau stresses in
        its amicus brief. Brief for Consumer Financial Protection Bureau
        as Amici Curiae Supporting Appellants at 22, Holden v. Holiday Inn
        Club Vacations Inc., No. 22-11014 (11th Cir. Dec. 16, 2022),
        2022 WL 17843088, at *22. But that is what Holiday did. Holden
        and Mayer just disagree with Holiday’s assessment that the debt
        was due and collectible.
               This is not to say the furnishers “are never required by the
        FCRA to accurately report information derived from the readily
        verifiable and straightforward application of law to facts.” Mader,
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        16                      Opinion of the Court                    22-11014

        56 F.4th at 270; see, e.g., Losch, 995 F.3d at 944–46 (holding that mis-
        reporting the clear effect of a bankruptcy discharge order on certain
        types of debt is a cognizable inaccuracy under the FCRA). “As cases
        like Losch . . . show, if a legal question is sufficiently settled so that
        the import on a particular debt is readily and objectively verifiable,
        the FCRA sometimes requires that the implications of that decision
        be reflected in credit reports.” Mader, 56 F.4th at 271.
               Still, contrary to Holden and Mayer’s contentions, the reso-
        lution of this contract dispute is not a straightforward application
        of law to facts. As the Mayer District Court noted, Florida state
        courts that have reviewed timeshare agreements—like the ones
        here—have come to conflicting conclusions about whether the de-
        fault provisions excused a consumer’s obligation to keep paying.
        Compare        Holiday    Inn    Club    Vacations    v.    Granger,
        No. 2018-CA-011778-O, 2021 WL 6254518, at *3 (Fla. 9th Cir. Ct.
        Mar. 15, 2021) (awarding Holiday a deficiency judgment against de-
        fendants based on a similar timeshare agreement), with Orange Lake
        Country Club, Inc. v. Arndt, No. 2016-CA-006342-O, ¶ 5 (Fla. 9th Cir.
        Ct. Aug. 14, 2019) (finding that Holiday (formerly Orange Lake
        Country Club) was not entitled to a deficiency judgment under an
        identical provision).
               Although “[t]he ultimate resolution of this case is surely frus-
        trating for some consumers,” consumers in Holden and Mayer’s
        position are not without recourse. Milgram, 72 F.4th at 1221 (Ros-
        enbaum, J., concurring). As noted by Judge Rosenbaum’s concur-
        rence in Milgram, consumers in Holden’s and Mayer’s shoes could
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        22-11014                   Opinion of the Court                                 17

        sue a furnisher for a declaration that they no longer owed a debt. 9
        Id. at 1222. “With that declaration in hand, [a consumer] would
        have a much stronger cudgel with which to force a furnisher to
        stop reporting [a] debt to a reporting agency.” Id. Or a consumer
        “could go directly to the reporting agency with the declaration and
        get the reporting agency to take it off [his or] her credit history.”
        Id.; see also 15 U.S.C. § 1681i. 10

        9 Holden and Mayer made one additional argument point at oral argument:

        because there was a bona fide dispute, it was misleading for Holiday not to
        report the dispute. True, “other circuits . . . have allowed a consumer’s claim
        to proceed against a furnisher on the basis of misleading statements or omis-
        sions,” even where the information reported “was technically accurate.” Felts
        v. Wells Fargo Bank, N.A., 893 F.3d 1305, 1318 (11th Cir. 2018). For example,
        the Fourth Circuit has stated that a consumer may have an FCRA claim against
        a furnisher who reports a debt “without any mention” that the consumer dis-
        puted the debt. See, e.g., Saunders v. Branch Banking & Tr. Co. of Va.,
        526 F.3d 142, 150 (4th Cir. 2008) (“The jury could reasonably conclude that
        [the furnisher’s] decision to report the debt without any mention of a dispute
        was ‘misleading . . . .’”).
             But Holden’s and Mayer’s complaints contain no such allegation. And alt-
        hough Holden and Mayer cited Saunders in their summary judgment briefing,
        they did not do so for this proposition. Nor does this argument appear in their
        briefing before us. Instead, Holden and Mayer made this argument for the
        first time at oral argument. In the absence of briefing on this issue—either
        before the District Courts or us—we decline to address whether such a claim
        would be viable here. See Access Now, Inc. v. Sw. Airlines Co., 385 F.3d 1324,
        1331 (11th Cir. 2004) (holding that arguments that were not raised at the dis-
        trict court in the first instance cannot be raised on appeal); United States v. Cu-
        chet, 197 F.3d 1318, 1321 n.6 (11th Cir. 1999) (declining to address an argument
        made for the first time at oral argument).
        10 Under 15 U.S.C. § 1681i(a)(1)(A),
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        18                      Opinion of the Court                       22-11014

                                    IV. Conclusion
                We decline to impose a bright-line rule “that only purely fac-
        tual or transcription errors are actionable under the FCRA.” Sessa,
        74 F.4th at 43. “Rather, in determining whether a claimed inaccu-
        racy is potentially actionable under [§ 1681s-2], a court must deter-
        mine, inter alia, whether the information in dispute is ‘objectively
        and readily verifiable.’” Id. (quoting Mader, 56 F.4th at 269). Be-
        cause the information in dispute here fails to meet that standard,
        we hold that Mayer and Holden do not have actionable FCRA
        claims against Holiday. Accordingly, we affirm the District Courts’
        judgments.
              AFFIRMED.

              if the completeness or accuracy of any item of information
              contained in a consumer’s file at a consumer reporting agency
              is disputed by the consumer and the consumer notifies the
              agency directly, or indirectly through a reseller, of such dis-
              pute, the agency shall, free of charge, conduct a reasonable re-
              investigation to determine whether the disputed information
              is inaccurate and record the current status of the disputed in-
              formation, or delete the item from the file . . . before the end
              of the 30-day period beginning on the date on which the
              agency receives the notice of the dispute from the consumer
              or reseller.