UK Credit Reference Agencies Unfit For Purpose and must be reformed - Discuss

Dr_Cuckoo3

VictimOfImpersonation wrote: »

In case anyone was wondering about Dr_Cuckoo_3's cryptic reference a few posts back, Delphi and CII were the subject of a 2011 MSE thread. (see post #3 that thread which gives names to the the Cached CRA Details systems being complained about.)

Basically one thing it means that CRAs are wrongly providing full credit report data in one large offline database to any organisation that pays enough for it. And customers have no idea who has bought it or looked at it because enquiries naturally aren't recorded anywhere. Worse than that, they are processing data using their own home-grown algorithms and applying their own discriminatory scores to such weird and wonderful concepts as "propensity to pay" and then selling those subjective concept scores as real personal data to commercial interests. That is indeed secret coded information. Thanks Doctor for reminding us.

This is a disgrace and anyone that comments that CRAs are fit for purpose must clearly be making the point that the purpose is purely commercial and not the slightest bit in the public interest.

Yes they are circumventing the requirement to disclose data in the same way that businesses withheld data by keeping it in a manual format when the Data Protection Act only applied to computer records a few years ago

The difference being the cosy relationship between the ICO and CRA's today

This Delphi/CII data is used by banks to make decisions and should be disclosed in the £2 report

Now VictimOfImpersonation was not aware of that previously - may I suggest that this is a better focus for his campaign than the rant in the first post

VictimOfImpersonation

Dr_Cuckoo_3 you appear to have a somewhat aloof style and a supposed need to be posting here in such a roundabout fashion that one wonders whether you simply wish to confuse or defuse the hot topic gaining traction here.

You may suggest all you like but the premise introduced in the thread is that CRAs are not fit for purpose and as is clear as day, the first post was far from being a rant!

Are you trying to derail the thread or change its subject ? Why are you then seemingly posting hot and cold in terms of alternate possibly relevant and irrelevant bogging down type posts?

A_Flock_Of_Sheep

VictimOfImpersonation wrote: »

Dr_Cuckoo_3 you appear to have a somewhat aloof style and a supposed need to be posting here in such a roundabout fashion that one wonders whether you simply wish to confuse or defuse the hot topic gaining traction here.

You may suggest all you like but the premise introduced in the thread is that CRAs are not fit for purpose and as is clear as day, the first post was far from being a rant!

Are you trying to derail the thread or change its subject ? Why are then seemingly you posting hot and cold in terms of alternate possibly relevant and irrelevant bogging down type posts?

I have always found Dr. Cuckoo to be very helpful on here and at times very humorous and he/she has always understood my aversion to CRA's and has never been judgemental about it.

VictimOfImpersonation

Well the style just seems a bit odd (and it sometimes takes one to know one!)

[Deleted User]

VictimOfImpersonation wrote: »

newbieboy, you make a lot of assumptions.

I haven't authorised Capita to search my CRA records for any purpose, ergo they are unlawfully accessing my personal data. If HMRC wish to access my personal data there is nothing I can do about it, but Capita are not the UK government and should be made to remember it by the Information Commissioner.

I see you are a T&Cs waving fanatic. Well before you wave them, do make sure they are relevant. Did I say I used a price comparison website? Even if I did, where was the upfront warning (not the buried smallprint)?

Just what public interest does it serve for X million private motorists to have their credit reports defiled by multiple entries everytime they get a quote at a comparison website (if that's what happened and I don't think it did because as I said, one particular large insurer was told by phone they could not proceed further with the quote)? And what public interest is served by Equifax alerting me 8 months later that those searches are deleted and then 10 months later they are printed on my full credit report?

I told you how CallCredit experienced a security hole (in 2009/2010). They issued an online full credit report to organised criminals who paid £12 for it using a Prepaid Mastercard in my name which had been obtained with no proper security checks. CallCredit then relied upon the Prepaid Mastercard issuer's non-existent security as their own.

You clearly are a fan of CRAs - do you work in financial services or are you just asserting stuff on the back of a fluffy understanding of what goes on?

I am rather articulate for a 25 year old arent I?

So here goes;
a) no, i do not work in financial services, nor am I a very fluffy person in all honesty. May I ask why your understanding is so much more comprehnsive than any one else on this site? Are you the oracle?

i am not a T&C waving fanatic, i have what is commonly reffered to as "common sense". This means that before i gob off on a public forum, I check the one item that EVERY company will slap you in the face with when you complain about something.."its in the terms and conditions Sir/Madam". I think your find that anyone that uses CRAs will have it in there T&Cs that they do. You choosing not to read them is YOUR Problem, no-one elses. The upfront warning is that box that says Before progressing do hou accept our T&Cs, that every company has.

C)There is no public interest, odds are there is no public interest in you. That is why those searches sometimes come under the section that no-one else can see on your report. Or they have the General Insurance field populated so they can be dismissed.

D) i can find no mention of a call credit security hole online. And i have looked. For a significant security breach it sure is non existent. Especially as it would be recorded somewhere.

Data can be removed if it is factually inaccurate, if it is correct then it should stay, this is reasonable in my mind, why should someone have something negative removed because they are sorry and trying to correct it? Bob next door who has worked hard to ensure all bills paid and stays in credit has worked hard and rightly deserves to be treated more favourably.

Also i dont believe the algorithms used by banks etc should be disclosed. That then makes it easier for items to be manipulated and the whole systems is flawed. And then everyone will pay in the long term.

VictimOfImpersonation

Twenty-five eh? Oh to be there again All that comfortable blissful ignorance based upon limited life experience. Happy days!

Must be even more blissful for you given that the UK education system has been in tatters throughout your life or did you get yours elsewhere?

Happy Christmas :rudolf:

PS re: CallCredit security hole in 2009/2010. Have you thought of calling them and asking if what I have said is true ?

[Deleted User]

VictimOfImpersonation wrote: »

Twenty-five eh? Oh to be there again All that comfortable blissful ignorance based upon limited life experience. Happy days!

Must be even more blissful for you given that the UK education system has been in tatters throughout your life or did you get yours elsewhere?

Happy Christmas :rudolf:

PS re: CallCredit security hole in 2009/2010. Have you thought of calling them and asking if what I have said is true ?

The ignorant person is you! You have absolutely no idea who I am, what i have done or what life experiences i have. As an FYI i have done more in my "limited life.." Than a lot of much older people i know.

Also your insinuation that due to your opinion of the UK education service (which you probably haven't been involved in for a considerable amount of time) I must be even more blissfully ignorant, is unbelievably judgemental and arrogant. As someone who has a very good job earning an extremely healthy wage, and who regularly has to tell people who have this life experience you consider much more useful how to do there job i find your statement extremely judgmental and in all honesty what is wrong with a lot of companies nowadays.

Experience is useful, however having an attitude like yours whereby someone in their mid twenties must be inferior due to this is hilarious.

And no i haven't called call credit, your the one making an accusation about them that you haven't managed to substantiate. Something so serious would be everywhere and yet this is the first anyone has heard of it.

Its the equivalent of me saying, did you know* google go out and kill penguins every lunch. You wont have heard about it, but it happened so i think we should get copies of all emails google send internally so we know everything they do in their offices. Complete tosh.

*Fabricated story

VictimOfImpersonation

Yes newbieboy, I am proud of my half century plus. What have you done so far except boast about earning a high salary for a 25 year old and played manager of some unfortunate oldies ? Been there, done that, thirty years ago! Have you built a good team? Er no, of course not, because you used the word "tell" people of (my sort of) life experience how to do their job. We can read you like a book newbieboy! Trust me - we old farts can read it all between your lines. Unless you have some amazing special experience that you are good at not disclosing like you have overcome some major disability or bereavement (and you don't sound like that because you haven't learned humility and big yourself up too much), then you haven't yet lived, but I am sure you will We forgive your youthful exhuberance. You on the other hand will just have to tolerate your elders and betters or you will soon have a fight on your hands at work and elsewhere - we are becoming the majority electorship and thank goodness it is so.

Now then, CallCredit know they can contact me again any time they like, but they won't because they know what I have said was unfortunately true. They didn't really want to talk about it much when I found out, and fobbed me off with a free year of access to my file :rotfl:

Do you really think that you can Google all the ills of this world? That is not how it works. First you have to have standards. Then you go looking for matches and breaches. You often won't find breaches like this in the headlines until you put them there.

innovate

Dr_Cuckoo3 wrote: »

Your area of expertise is savings and matters of appeal to those with significant savings and you have recently discovered that current accounts pay more than savings accounts (you are not a "stoozer" as far as I am aware)

Thanks for confirming that you have a simple enough mind to think you can determine a person's expertise from what they post with a random nickname on MSE.

innovate

Dr_Cuckoo3 wrote: »

Though not clued up on credit products (because it is new to them)

You have just about no clue.

Merry Christmas.