Two enclosures that should be mailed with your FCRA dispute letter to a credit bureau


Two enclosures that should be mailed with your FCRA dispute letter to a credit bureauA picture of a mailbox with the words "Two enclosures that should be mailed with your FCRA dispute letter to a credit bureau"

There are two things you should include in any dispute letter a credit bureau (TransUnion, Equifax, etc.

  1. Driver’s license or another form of government ID. 
  2. Recent bill or statement that shows your name, address, and the company name. 

Why should you include these items if they aren’t required?

Credit bureaus hate investigating claims. They don’t make any money from investigating claims.

So, we are trying to anticipate what the credit bureaus will do to avoid investigating your claim. 

We want to anticipate what they will do and then block them from using those excuses. 

You could send the perfect letter under the FCRA and do everything right. 

Then, instead of getting a response saying the error will be fixed or deleted, you receive this:

“We received a suspicious letter from you. We don’t think you really sent it, so we are not going to investigate to protect you. If you want us to investigate this, enclose a driver’s license or government ID and a recent statement.”

We know this is how they operate, so when they get this letter along with the two enclosures, they cannot use this excuse.

Sometimes they will still try. If they do, you can sue them for this

When you have sent in your proof of identity along with your dispute via certified mail, this makes it very hard for them to deny. 

When we sue them, we tell the judge the bureau has done a lousy job and refused to do any investigation at all. 

Their defense is often that they didn’t really know this was the consumer. This argument begins to crumble when we show exactly what was sent with our dispute.

The credit bureaus may say they didn’t see it. They didn’t really read the letter, assumed there was no proof enclosed, and sent out a form letter requesting identification. 

This is not a good position for the credit bureau to be in. 

Many times we will even include in our dispute letter “don’t refuse to investigate because you believe this is not me. I have enclosed my driver’s license and a recent bank statement.” 

Imagine trying to defend your position having rejected a request for not having exactly what was enclosed.

This is ridiculous.

Anytime we can show that these companies are dishonest, incompetent, or foolish, this is good. These companies should be held accountable.

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Thanks and have a great day!

 

John Watts

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