Stuck in an endless dispute loop with the credit bureaus? Feeling financially and emotionally drained from fighting credit report errors with Equifax, Experian, or TransUnion…without actually getting anywhere?
You are not alone, and a credit bureau lawsuit may be your best bet at finding your way out of this frustrating cycle. But will a credit bureau lawsuit turn out to be just another long journey to nowhere? Thankfully, no!
Capable credit report lawyers can help put an end to your credit report dispute for good. And you may not realize that winning a credit bureau lawsuit can be even easier than you think.
The secret to winning a credit bureau lawsuit the easy way is that the credit bureaus cave against experienced consumer protection attorneys like those at Consumer Justice Law Firm.
Once the paperwork is filed, the credit bureaus end up falling all over themselves to settle lawsuits with Offers of Judgment rather than taking their chances going up against one of our skilled consumer protection attorneys in court.
This pattern has played out time and time again, whether you’re tackling a TranUnion lawsuit, Equifax lawsuit, or Experian lawsuit.
Learn what an offer of judgment is, why credit bureaus accept them, and how it can mean a quick and easy solution to your credit report dispute and credit bureau lawsuit for good.
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How to Dispute a Credit Report in 4 Simple Steps
Under the Fair Credit Reporting Act, you actually have powerful rights that work in your favor, including the right to dispute credit report errors. And the steps, at least in theory, couldn’t be any simpler.
- Request & Review– you can request free weekly copies of your credit report from all three credit bureaus through the verified site annualcreditreport.com. Look over the details carefully to spot errors.
- Submit a dispute– write a formal dispute letter, clearly pointing out the errors in your report and explaining why the data is inaccurate, false, or misleading. Send your dispute by certified mail to create a traceable record and avoid waiving any critical rights by using online dispute platforms.
- Provide documentation– support your dispute by sending along copies of documents that verify your claims. The credit bureaus have 30 days to investigate and respond to your dispute and fix their mistakes.
- Talk to a credit reporting lawyer– if you bring us in at the beginning as soon as you know you’re facing credit reporting errors, we can help gather the supporting evidence and draft the legally sound dispute letter.
Of course, the credit bureaus decided on the steps in the dispute process, so the simplicity of the steps is a little misleading. You still need the credit bureaus to do the right thing.
Why Do You Need to File a Credit Bureau Lawsuit?
If you’ve followed the rules and checked off the steps in the dispute process one by one, but haven’t gotten anywhere- it’s time to consider a credit bureau lawsuit against Experian, Equifax, or TransUnion.
The most common reasons that people need to file a credit bureau lawsuit are:
- Being Ignored. When you dispute credit report errors, the credit bureaus have 30 days to investigate and respond. If they don’t respond, or don’t respond within 30 days, you likely just stepped into the cycle of wash, rinse, and repeat that torments consumers trying to clear data errors off their credit reports.
- Confirming the wrong data. It’s a toss up- is it worse to be ignored by the credit bureaus or to hear from them that they did investigate and their investigation confirmed that the data you’re disputing is, according to their records, correct. What?!
- Either way, you’re trapped in a nonsense loop, and working with an experienced credit reporting lawyer to file a credit bureau lawsuit is likely your only shot at getting out.
- Repeating the errors. Sometimes, even a successful dispute isn’t enough to keep your credit report clean. In fact, even if the credit bureaus review your dispute, investigate the facts, recognize their error, and fix the bad data, it still might not be enough.
- Credit report errors have a way of showing up again and again…until a successful credit bureau lawsuit breaks the cycle once and for all.
For more information about some of the most common types of credit report errors that plague consumers, check out our practice pages for credit reporting errors, mixed credit reports, mistakenly reported as deceased, and identity theft recovery.
Why do Credit Bureaus Cave so Easily When Sued for Errors?
The credit bureaus have taken to relying on Offers of Judgment to settle credit bureau lawsuits with consumers who have been harmed by credit report errors.
What the heck is an Offer of Judgment? It is a tool that the Federal Courts make available to the parties in a lawsuit that lets them settle the lawsuit without going all the way through the process of having a trial.
Usually, this means that the defendant (the credit bureau) makes an offer to the plaintiff (you) to settle the case for a certain amount of money. But why would a credit bureau willingly offer you money to settle your case before it’s even gone to trial?
As a team of credit reporting lawyers dedicated to protecting the rights of consumers against billion-dollar credit bureaus, we don’t know for sure why credit bureaus cave in so easily when faced with a credit bureau lawsuit, but we have a few ideas.
- Avoiding costly litigation– Trials cost money. Credit bureaus like to keep their money, not spend it on trials with consumers that they’ve harmed.
- Limiting public exposure– The more public exposure a credit bureau lawsuit gets, or the more common a credit bureau’s pattern and history of consumer lawsuits gets, the more likely it is that other consumers will realize that they have legal rights that empower them to fight back and win, too.
- Acknowledging legal risk– Sometimes the risk of having to make a bigger payout is too much for the credit bureaus and they’d rather just pay you money early on and get it over with than take the risk of a trial.
- This can happen when your case has strong evidence- like documented proof that the data included in your credit report was inaccurate, misleading, or flat out wrong- and you can show that the credit bureau ignored or mishandled your dispute and you suffered financial, credit, employment, housing, reputational, or emotional harm.
- Preventing precedent-setting rulings– Some cases present a different kind of threat to credit bureaus- namely, they could end up in a decision that has lasting implications for the entire consumer data industry going forward. Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion will try to avoid these cases going to trial at all costs.
- Regulatory pressure– Though the role of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau(CFPB) is somewhat uncertain at the moment, it is still a consumer watchdog agency that is responsible for helping people like you push back against out-of-control corporations. When the CFPB is involved, the credit bureaus might feel regulatory pressure to settle.
- Avoiding accountability– In our experience, by using Offers of Judgment to settle credit bureau lawsuits, these corporations can avoid taking any responsibility for the errors they make, letting them just continue to repeat the same mistakes over and over again on a daily basis. In other words, they cut the costs of going to trial and still fail to invest in updating their data gathering and review protocols. This is the one that makes us angry, and should make you angry, too.
For some more insight into just how much the credit bureaus don’t care about fixing the problems in their own reporting systems, check out this lawsuit the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau had to file.
How Does an Offer of Judgment Benefit You?
Even though the name of the game for the credit bureaus is using Offers of Judgment to settle credit bureau lawsuits quickly and easily in order to avoid any real accountability, there are benefits for you.
When an Equifax lawsuit, Experian lawsuit, or TransUnion lawsuit is settled using an Offer of Judgment, the credit bureaus are basically saying, “Here, take our money and go away.”
That may not feel as deeply satisfying to you as a lawsuit that ends in a trial where you crush the credit bureau and land an exciting headline about being a consumer who fought back and won, but it is an easy breezy win. Afterall, it’s money in your bank account without the burden of a trial.
Because of this, consumers nationwide are taking notice and opting to pursue credit bureau lawsuits. In states like Texas, California, Wisconsin, Missouri, Florida, New York, Minnesota, Illinois, and others, credit bureau lawsuits are understandably hot.
Since Consumer Justice Law Firm is a nationwide consumer protection law firm, we can help you no matter where you are.
Recent Credit Bureau Lawsuits That Ended in Easy Judgments!
While not all cases end with an easy Offer of Judgment, the frequency with which credit bureau lawsuits are resolved using this approach is increasing. And for those consumers on the receiving end, it’s like having a credit bureau throw money at you just to make you go away.
A False Charge-Off Nearly Wrecked Him
After a few missed payments, our client was put through a legal battle over a car loan in his name, but was ultimately granted a legal order showing that he did not owe anything on the remaining amount of the loan. However, despite this fact, his credit reports were showing the car loan as a charge off with a past-due balance, which was a major hit to his credit score.
He followed all of the proper dispute procedures, even providing the credit bureaus with a copy of the court order showing that he didn’t owe anything on the loan. Yet they responded by saying their investigations confirmed the accuracy of the information they reported.
The credit bureaus failed to undertake a proper investigation, failed to consider legally sound evidence, failed to fix their broken review protocols, and failed to correct the errors that were detrimentally impacting our client. Or, in real terms, they failed to take him seriously at every turn and failed to care about the harm they caused.
Once our credit bureau lawsuit hit the docket, it was only a matter of time before both Equifax and TransUnion wanted to settle the lawsuit with an Offer of Judgment. Check, please!
A Mixed Credit Report that Wouldn’t Stop
When our client started seeing incorrect entries on his credit reports, he took matters into his own hands and filed disputes, following the rules of the game as determined by the credit bureaus. But when the errors disappeared, only to return again at a later date, he quickly realized there was a pattern forming- spot false info, fight false info, fix false info, then do it all again!
After catching on that this was a persistent problem, he figured out that the false information showing up on his credit reports was from another person with a similar name, who our client reached out to on social media. It turned out that they shared similar names, birthdates, and social security numbers, despite not being related or affiliated at all. And, not surprisingly, the other guy had similar errors cropping up over and over again in his credit reports, too.
Once we got involved and bumped our client’s dispute attempts up to a full-blown credit bureau lawsuit, he finally got the type of response he should have received from the beginning- concern and a willingness to fix the problem and pay for the damage.
When TransUnion threw an Offer of Judgment at him, wrapping up his credit bureau lawsuit was as simple as getting a direct deposit. Boom!
GET JUSTICE! Easy, Peasy Offers from Quaking Credit Bureaus
Whether you’ve just discovered credit report errors for the first time, you’ve been battling them for a while, or you’re stuck in the loop of unbothered carelessness on behalf of the credit bureaus, we can help.
At Consumer Justice Law Firm, our compassionate and knowledgeable legal advocates and our talented and experienced consumer protection attorneys prioritize your case. We review the facts, help you gather the evidence, put together a legally sound dispute, and file a credit bureau lawsuit when they’ve either gone too far or won’t listen up at all.
Best of all? We offer FREE consultations and don’t charge you a dime out of pocket. The credit bureaus pay your legal bills for you when they settle the case. Moving from credit report fiction to credit report accuracy has never been so easy or so satisfying. No justice, no fee. Call now.
FREE CONSULTATIONS. Zero out of pocket costs. No justice, no fee.