Are credit reference agencies government regulated?

agarnett

meer53 wrote: »

Your opinion. A very negative one. Just like your posts.

Negative as in the exact opposite of positively parasitic? :rotfl:

Buzby

Thrugelmir wrote: »

The answer to your issues are simple. Only use cash. Prepay your bills. Then you'll never to need use these lenders or have dealings with businesses that use CRA's to ascertain whether an individual is worth trading with.

And how, pray, would someone achieve this? I have tried this for the last 40 years and have been amazed how a 'credit check' evolved from its stated aim (of providing information as to your reliability to receive credit) to a requirement to provide a DoB for things that have no relevance. If you want to pay Virgin and Sky in advance they'll let you - but you'll still have a full credit check regardless.

The paying off of a service in full every month is not you being extended credit in any formal sense, and the processes are being manipulated by the CRA's in order to make their services indispensable to their clients (the commercial sector, not consumers).

The manipulation continues - and they are currently lobbying to receive Council Tax payment details as part of the quid pro quo of helping councils trace debtors.

Shady? Maybe not in the accepted sense, but as a wide remit is allowed for their definition of credit, it is not too far off the mark.

Thrugelmir

Buzby wrote: »

And how, pray, would someone achieve this?

That's an individuals choice. If they don't like the system opt out. If everybody paid the the money they owe on time then there would be no requirement for debt collection agencies or credit reference agencies.

Bad debts cost other people money. Too many people believe in magic money trees these days.

Archi_Bald

agarnett wrote: »

CRAs are very shady organisations who have been largely kept out of many countries because they are not wanted.

How would you like to prove in a UK Court of Law that any UK CRA is very shady? Which developed country does not use CRAs?

agarnett wrote: »

The majority of the people in most countries are sheep.

So not only do you accuse CRAs of engaging in shady business, you are also insulting most people in the world. Brilliant.

Thank goodness there is the ignore function so I don't have to read any more from agarnett.

agarnett

ArchiBald wrote:

How would you like to prove in a UK Court of Law that any UK CRA is very shady?

Will I need to, do you think? Might I need to demonstrate with dimly lit examples?

Which developed country does not use CRAs?

Well the largest in the world is Equifax and they employ people in 14 countries. That's not exactly a majority of the world's nations, now is it? Nor does it come close to a count of what we might call the developed countries. The Wikipedia entry on credit bureaus or Credit reference agencies is translated into a massively significant seven languages other than English! They were Russian, Czech, Polish, Korean, Lithuanian, Portuguese and German. Hasn't been much call for it in other languages apparently.

But I did find this list on the Wikipedia page:
Country Major bureaus
Argentina Nosis Credit Bureau, Veraz Equifax
Armenia Armenian Credit Reporting Agency (ACRA)
Australia CreditorWatch, Veda Advantage, Dun & Bradstreet, Experian
Botswana Compuscan
Brazil Boa Vista Serviços, Serasa Experian
Canada Equifax, TransUnion
Cape Verde Creditinfo
Chile Dicom Equifax
Colombia Cifin
Costa Rica TransUnion
Dominican Republic Data-Cr!dito, TransUnion
Ecuador Equifax, Acredita
El Salvador TransUnion
Germany Creditreform, Bürgel, SCHUFA
Guatemala TransUnion
Guyana Creditinfo
Honduras TransUnion
Hong Kong TransUnion
Iceland Creditinfo
India High Mark Credit Information Services, CIBIL, Experian & Equifax
Jamaica Creditinfo
Kazakhstan Creditinfo
Lithuania Creditinfo
Malta Creditinfo
Mexico Equifax, TransUnion
Morocco Experian
Namibia Compuscan
Nicaragua TransUnion
New Zealand Veda Advantage, Dun & Bradstreet, Centrix
Pakistan eCIB
Peru Equifax
Poland Polish Credit Bureau "BIK"
Romania Creditinfo
Rwanda Compuscan
South Africa Compuscan, Experian, TransUnion
South Korea National Information & Credit Evaluation
Tanzania Creditinfo
Uganda Compuscan
Ukraine Creditinfo
United Kingdom Experian, Equifax, Callcredit
United States Experian, FICO, Equifax, TransUnion, Innovis, PRBC
Saudi Arabia SIMAH Saudi Credit Bureau
Singapore DP Information Group, Experian

I hasten to add that I am sure they are all fine upstanding citizens :rotfl:

meer53

agarnett wrote: »

Negative as in the exact opposite of positively parasitic? :rotfl:

No, negative as in a complete unwillingness to even consider there may be benefits to using a CRA.

How about stopping using search engines and the famously unreliable Wikipedia for information.

agarnett

How about stopping using search engines and the famously unreliable Wikipedia for information.

Are you kidding me, meer53?

You make decisions about people's livelihoods and you are out playing alone on the internet and you have no idea about the validity or power of real statistics?

In 1995 if you did a search on the internet and got no hits or 617,000 hits then yes you'd have to take the result with a pinch of salt, but this is darn near 20 years later. The internet is mature, baby. It's just ripe for uncovering the truth in a few clicks, that is unless powerful forces start to deliberately skew the results to hide the truth. Do you think that critics of CRAs have actually been doing that? Are you paranoid now?

Don't you have any cognisance whatsoever of the likelihood that those who are first reliable enough to actually care about publishing a list of international credit bureaus on Wikipedia, country by country, and for their work to actually be peer group satisfied so that it actually persists, might actually be pretty close to accurate at the point they published it?

And don't you think it is interesting that Google tells me things like the word cognizance (American) is nearly seven times as prevalent on the internet as the English spelling cognisance?

Sure the Wiki Credit Bureau page didn't mention Equifax in Pakistan, because that may be just a little bit too sensitive to keep repeating in public, and even if you forgive Pakistan being missing, the list still doesn't quite mention the fourteen countries in which the Equifax Wiki page claims it employs people, so maybe there are a few sleepers after all.

I'd say it's a pretty interesting list far closer to what I suggested was the truth of the matter than any hopeful thinking of US developed world domination by young Thrugelmir, wouldn't you?

Or maybe he was thinking Experian ... now there's another story ... the number of subsidiaries and ex Experian executive startups is quite amazing ... but where do they get their startup data? ... and who do they sell it to ? ... Hmm

bsms1147

Better get the tin foil hats ready, guys.

Thrugelmir

agarnett wrote: »

I'd say it's a pretty interesting list far closer to what I suggested was the truth of the matter than any hopeful thinking of US developed world domination by young Thrugelmir, wouldn't you?

Been around for longer than you I suspect. Also far wiser with regards to financial matters. For all your ranting nothing will change. As the benefits outweigh the disadvantages. Majority rules.

agarnett

Thrugelmir wrote: »

Been around for longer than you I suspect.

Yes I never doubted it, but what is your raison d'etre on MSE?

Also far wiser with regards to financial matters.

Ah I think you mean you are able to run with the pack, whereas I openly despise the pack?

For all your ranting nothing will change.

Ah yes I have heard that a few times and seen the words eaten too.

As the benefits outweigh the disadvantages. Majority rules.

I don't think you lower yourself frequently enough to a level where you could even begin to prove that one way or the other. The way you post your frequent 'take it or leave it' mantra, it is clear you despise ordinary folk who have no choices in many financial matters where the current systems you laud are clearly working against them.