Confused about Identity theft

MrsGrey

In March I discovered that a card had been taken out with Amex, using my name and an old address. I used to have a card with Amex, but they had my new address, and had been writing to me here, since I moved in 2011. The card was approved in January this year, and ran up £8k+ of debt.
Amex have admitted the fraud and that it is their fault. However, they will only tell Experian, not Equifax and Call Credit who are the agencies that have the record on show to all . Amex have told CIFAS ,and oddly Call Credit have the fraud alert showing in my credit report, yet my score is still badly affected by the fraudulent account.
Is it really my job to sort this out with Equifax and Call Credit? I was originally told by Amex that they would do it. Now they say I have to, despite it being their error when they approved the fraudulent application.
Does anyone have experience of this?

fermi

So Amex still has adverse account data on your reports?

If so then make the formal complaint to Amex, stating that by knowing recording a fraudulent account which is not yours on your credit report, they are in breach of their obligations under the Data Protection Act 1998, and that the defamatory information must be removed by them.

Make sure that you stress that it is a formal complaint, where if they do not or refuse to remove the information, you will be taking your complaint on to both the FOS and the ICO, will seek financial redress against Amex, and may consider legal action

Stevie_Palimo

I second what Fermi says and will add that going to the ICO is a complete waste of time and a farce of a governing outfit so use the FOS that are only slightly better should they not play ball then go the legal route of which you can claim all costs incurred from phone calls, stamps, any printed documents and if the Court that you take it understands the law correctly damages to.

MrsGrey

In this latest conversation, an Amex man said that they would only inform Experian, not Equifax or Call Credit. That is because "Experian was the one where we did the search". He was totally unconcerned that my credit score is still affected on the other two -- said it was my job to clear it up. (Oddly, on Call Credit, the account is not there, there is a CIFAS warning, but "No notice of correction has been issued". Still my score has been affected.) I did pursue it with some feeling -- as to why I had to do this when it was their negligence that led to the fraud, by their own admission. He had no answer, just went into broken record mode.
I would just do this but I fear it will be a long long job.
Thanks for the advice. I'll hunt out a complaint route for Amex. I can find nothing online about what is the normal process; Call Credit don't give phone advice and CIFAS are always too busy to answer the phone

fermi

Their complaints procedures:

https://www.americanexpress.com/uk/content/complaints-procedures/

Stevie_Palimo

Pen to paper with a request for a reply is always best in these situations as ringing these Companies tends to go through to just admin staff that have no real clue as to handling issues like this.

SuperHan

And I'd drop out the CallCredit part of your complaint if the account isn't showing there... If Amex have never provided info to CallCredit, then they have nothing to correct - it can't be wrong if it's omitted.

Concentrate on the information they have provided to Equifax that is incorrect.

Ben8282

You are blameless in this. It is for AMEX to repair the damage that they have done.