CRAs serve no good purpose. Their databases should be destroyed.

agarnett

I have a great deal of experience of financial services over 4 decades both as a customer and practitioner. I have also worked in Compliance and been responsible for Data Protection matters.

Now, because I am needing to assist my elderly parents more and more with their affairs, I am realising what a totally useless and irrelevant thing a CRA is in the UK.

I have spent some hours in the last ten days unravelling a totally stupid CRA problem which has denied my parents access to a basic right essential banking service - a plastic debit card with PIN.

It is essential purely for ID purposes in a bank branch who no longer have any other convenient means to ID and then efficiently serve a customer of 60 years standing at the same branch they opened their account all those years ago. My parents have never used an ATM and always pay cash or cheque or use Direct Debit. They pay a cheque to cash each month for drawing the money for their routine household expenditure.

But currently that bank cannot issue a new card because the CRAs computer has told the bank computer that my parents are a risk. The bank are sympathetic but unable to say exactly what the obstruction is and suggested I needed to get a credit report.

My parents have never used the internet, so I have had to apply for the credit report on their behalf, sat at the computer as if I was not me, but them. They have no idea what I am typing in and how I make things happen such as the Experian PIN code that arrived in the post which they (I) needed to activate the CRA account.

What's a CRA account? Why does it cost £14.99 a month? Is the PIN code for the new card that the bank are issuing? We still haven't got the new card yet Alfred!

Why do I even have to begin to explain all this cr¤p to two of our most senior citizens who have not put a foot wrong in their lives?

Because it's the system?

I daren't even begin to tell them that I can only get one out of three possible credit reports because I need a valid card (theirs not mine) to use as ID online at Equifax and Noddle! That's where we started - we asked the bank for a card and they said the computers say No! With Equifax and Noddle I'd never find out why the bank said no to a card because they both need a card in order to tell me!

It isn't resolved yet because I am waiting for a call from the bank to put a plan in place, but do you know what I think caused the problem?

A single mail order purchase from a national newspaper classified ad for the grand sum of £14.99, a pair of cheap trousers that were paid by cheque, apparently two months late at one point but settled 3 months ago. The outfit that was permitted to place this data on file seems to be a sole trader and not even a limited company.

And, there are other "negative" factors - my parents have never had any other credit save for a mortgage that was paid of years ago and that does not figure on a credit report. They have no mobile phone account. I pay and manage that for them - not that they ever use it! So they are a credit risk because the header and footer on their single page printed credit report takes up more space than their personal data; right? WRONG!

So they are denied their card and they look at me disbelievingly with those totally transparent eyes that have seen things through WW2 that no person should ever see.

What a bunch of dumb sheep we have all become in the UK to put up with such nonsense by the shysters that hoard so much false and irrelevant data about us and charge us to access it and refuse to delete it.

I myself have had some correspondence in the last few days about feedback I gave a bank about their carelessness with my own CRA data. I got an Equifax alert two or hree months ago telling me that a Credit Card I have used on and off for two decades had been marked "dormant". I told the bank that was cr¤p so what were their criteria for even passing such irrelevant data and today they have just written saying their dormancy criteria on credit cards is now 3 months and therefore complaint not upheld and sorry we didn't set a timescale on responding to your feedback, and here's fifty quid ! Do I want fifty quid to accept their view that I am wrong? No I do not. They can send me fifty thousand and then I might forget it and let them stew in their own juice, but for goodness sakes!

What the hell are they all on?

[Deleted User]

You don't need to pay £14.99 to see Experian's meaningless score, you can get a copy of the credit report for £2.

The CRA systems aren't perfect, but lenders need to be able to see people's history to decide whether or not to lend. I don't really see another way around it.

agarnett

[Deleted User] wrote:

You don't need to pay £14.99 to see Experian's meaningless score, you can get a copy of the credit report for £2.

The CRA systems aren't perfect, but lenders need to be able to see people's history to decide whether or not to lend. I don't really see another way around it.

With all due respect, I know I can get a credit report cheaper than £14.99, but if I want instant answers I cannot without going through the motions to sign up online and cancel again before 30 days are up.

And with all due respect, just because you and the person that thanked you for your "useful" post cannot see a way round it, does not mean that in any sense your opinion is well-founded.

Yes there needs to be a bad boys and girls database which should be strictly controlled by government in the same way that bankruptcy arrangements are recorded, but there should not be any private database containing records about us all, especially since such a high proportion of it is dangerously irrelevant, false and effectively hijacks our true identities. It is completely wrong, and for you to dismiss the consequences so easily just makes me think of sheep again, I'm afraid to say.

You can let them daub your back with any colour paint they like, but they aren't going to daub mine willy-nilly without getting bitten, or butted up the backside on the internet!

stclair

Which bank are you referring to?

What type off account do they have?

You can get all three credit reports by sending a £2.00 cheque or postal order.

Thrugelmir

CRAs serve no good purpose. Their databases should be destroyed.

Perhaps you'd feel differently if you ran your own business.

tberry6686

CRA's are not perfect but at present there isn't a better system available.

a high proportion of it is dangerously irrelevant, false and effectively hijacks our true identities.

I suspect that your are just ranting off here about a percieved slight on your parents. The evidence available would suggest that the vast majority of records are correct (if you look at the numerous threads on this forum you will see that it is common for people to complain about inaccurate records and then discover that it is either their own fault they are wrong or that they are actually correct).

I have no idea what you mean with hijacking our true identities. That just makes you sound like one of the tinfoil hat brigade.

[Deleted User]

With all due respect, maybe don't post on a public forum inviting opinions if you're so sure yours is right.

I think the current CRA systems are massively flawed, but until someone wants to establish another centralised database (which will no doubt also be open to errors?) there currently is no other way around it. I don't think I'm a 'sheep' because I'm not calling for all databases, the majority of which are accurate and invaluable, to be destroyed.

GingerBob_3

[Deleted User] wrote:

You don't need to pay £14.99 to see Experian's meaningless score, you can get a copy of the credit report for £2.

The CRA systems aren't perfect, but lenders need to be able to see people's history to decide whether or not to lend. I don't really see another way around it.

So how did they do it before the CRAs existed, circa 1960s for example?

tberry6686

GingerBob wrote: »

So how did they do it before the CRAs existed, circa 1960s for example?

No debit cards, payments were by cheque. People having a mortgage outside of their normal bank was unusual, If you needed cash you had to go to a bank or find a shop that would cash a cheque, credit cards were relatively rare, if you wanted a loan you had to see your bank manager etc.

Westminster

Why not just get a basic bank account for them?

GingerBob_3

tberry6686 wrote: »

No debit cards, payments were by cheque. People having a mortgage outside of their normal bank was unusual, If you needed cash you had to go to a bank or find a shop that would cash a cheque, credit cards were relatively rare, if you wanted a loan you had to see your bank manager etc.

I seem to recall having a credit card (Access card) before the CRAs existed - I think so, anyway.