Identity theft - shop direct

Rocholl

Hi, looking for some advice for my current situation ideally someone with a similar experience who managed to resolve it.
My partner and I are looking to purchase our first home together and will need a mortgage. As such we have been checking our credit scores, in my case I received a notification of a hard search from Shop Direct (littlewoods/very) I contacted their fraud team and my address was used as a previous address with a random address in my area as current. The fraudster has opted for click and collect (blows my mind they don’t require first order to be delivered to billing address as this invites fraud). In my case the application was declined due to information not matching I have since had the address hard search and account removed from my credit file. A CIFAS victim of fraud marker was placed on me and I was advised any applications for credit would be subject to further validation before they were accepted/declined and would not affect my credit rating if it was not me. 3 days before the previous hard search was due to drop off, another hard search from yet again shop direct is now going to show up on my report as the previous fraudulent attempt was due to drop off, so back at square one. Yet another CIFAS victim marker is being added to my report for this most recent hard search. 

In my partners case she has never checked clearscore, her Experian is 950+ she checked clearscore and it’s at 245 with missed payments from January - May 2020, take a wild guess, shop direct, who only report to equifax. She contacted them and they have advised she now has a CIFAS marker for evasion of payments and they have sold the debt to Lowell’s, they would not give her the phone number used to create the account in her name, again it was registered under a random address for click and collect. They have advised they will request the CIFAS marker to be removed and a victim marker to be added to replace it. They have told her they can’t remove the missed payments from her credit report as they don’t hold the debt, they have given her Lowell’s number and told them she needs to ring them to tell them she did not take out the credit so Shop direct can buy back the debt from them, once this is done they can remove the missed payments.
My main questions are
1) Should I still have fraudulent hard searches showing on my report to be later removed if I have a CIFAS victim marker and the lender declines the application due to it not passing validation or should they never be added in the first place.

2) Is what shop direct say true regarding them being unable to remove missed payments from my partners report due to them not holding the debt.
3) is it my partners responsibility to speak to Lowell’s to tell them to sell the debt to shop direct or is it shop directs responsibility to approach Lowell’s to buy the debt back as they missold it.
4) Is shop direct acting within regulations by allowing customers to buy items with new credit, while not requiring it to be sent to the billing address. Who can I contact to complain about this as I see it as a serious risk and it essentially invites fraudsters to use their site.

From a lot of searching the web for advise on mortgages with issues like this Shop direct are mentioned time and time and time again so I am clearly not the only one facing this issue with this company. I contacted colleagues as my partner and I work together and we believe our details may be stolen from our employers systems. (who I will not name for obvious reasons) After checking their credit files it turns out 2 more of my colleagues have had the exact same thing happen with shop direct yet again, their processes are clearly unfit for purpose and they see nothing wrong with this?

Rocholl

TLDR
My partner and I have both been victims of ID theft with fraudster using shop direct. My partner has CIFAS Fraud marker, missed payments and debt sold to Lowell’s debt recovery, my searches have been removed and I have victim marker:

1) Should I still have fraudulent hard searches showing on my report to be later removed if I have a CIFAS victim marker and the lender declines the application due to it not passing validation or should they never be added in the first place.

2) Is what shop direct say true regarding them being unable to remove missed payments from my partners report due to them not holding the debt.

3) is it my partners responsibility to speak to Lowell’s to tell them to sell the debt to shop direct or is it shop directs responsibility to approach Lowell’s to buy the debt back as they missold it.

4) Is shop direct acting within regulations by allowing customers to buy items with new credit, while not requiring it to be sent to the billing address. Who can I contact to complain about this as I see it as a serious risk and it essentially invites fraudsters to use their site.

D3xt3r5L4b

The original creditors is responsible for any changes, so ShopDirect in this instance not Lowell’s.

Also don’t pay any attention to your scores - no one else does. 

Rocholl

It’s not necessarily our scores I’m concerned about it’s that my partner now has false missed payments (adverse credit) and also a CIFAS fraud marker for evading payments on her report. Which are both grounds for an instant rejection on any mortgage application, this is a huge set back as we have my place SSTC, and we’re ready to move in somewhere. Would we be need to wait for the reports to update so a full month before we could apply or would a lender be able to see the corrections once shop direct makes them?

bazzyb

Rocholl said:

1) Should I still have fraudulent hard searches showing on my report to be later removed if I have a CIFAS victim marker and the lender declines the application due to it not passing validation or should they never be added in the first place.

2) Is what shop direct say true regarding them being unable to remove missed payments from my partners report due to them not holding the debt.
3) is it my partners responsibility to speak to Lowell’s to tell them to sell the debt to shop direct or is it shop directs responsibility to approach Lowell’s to buy the debt back as they missold it.
4) Is shop direct acting within regulations by allowing customers to buy items with new credit, while not requiring it to be sent to the billing address. Who can I contact to complain about this as I see it as a serious risk and it essentially invites fraudsters to use their site.

1) Yes the searches should show, as it is an accurate record of what has happened. If it had been you who had applied then they would have had to search before they would see the CIFAS marker. Notwithstanding that the search should of course now be removed, it is right that it should show to begin with. 

2) Yes, the CRA will only update information based on what the creditor reports, they can’t go on the say so of a third party for obvious reasons. 

3) I would expect Shop Direct to sort out taking “your” account back rather than expecting you to arrange it - especially in a case like this. 

4) I’m not sure what regulations you refer to but they will have fraud prevention measures in place and they should be able to demonstrate due diligence. It seems that this works up to a point as they didn’t set up one of the accounts as they couldn’t verify it as genuine. Your complaint would be directly with Shop Direct but they’re unlikely to reveal their fraud prevention policies as it is commercially sensitive. Ultimately what they will allow for a first order will come down to how much exposure to fraud risk they are comfortable with as a business as it is they who ultimately end up out of pocket. 

Rocholl

Thanks for the reply @bazzyb re your answer to 2 I don’t mean the CRA are refusing to remove the missed payments, it’s shop direct the lender who have filed them.

 They are saying they can’t remove them due to not holding the debt, surely as the lender in question if they are accepting that this is a case of identity theft which they have hence removing CIFAS markers, shouldn’t they be able to have them removed from my partners report?

 What they do with the debt afterwards is their problem as far as I am concerned as their fraud prevention has failed, they can report it to the police as they have enough information for the perp to be tracked down.

bazzyb

Rocholl said:

Thanks for the reply @bazzyb re your answer to 2 I don’t mean the CRA are refusing to remove the missed payments, it’s shop direct the lender who have filed them.

 

I understood what you meant but what I am saying is that Shop Direct have no authority currently to remove the data from your file. As far as the CRAs are concerned, Lowell are the creditor and Shop Direct are essentially a third party. The CRAs can only report what Lowell tell them. 

Once Shop Direct take ownership of your debt then they will be able to update the CRAs and correct the information. 

Rocholl

Ahhh I see that makes sense, thanks for clarifying she’s going to ring Lowell’s tomorrow anyway but if she has no luck I’ll tell her to ask shop direct to take ownership and sort out reclaiming the debt themselves. I daren’t mention it tonight as the stress of it all has caused her to have an asthma attack today.

Thanks for your help really appreciate you answering, all of this has been a huge shock to us and we keep getting different answers to our queries, with the agents never sounding 100% in what they are saying. 

As far as I can tell so far I am pretty much good to go for mortgage application as yes there are hard searches but each one now has a subsequent CIFAS victim marker so any lender would be able to review.

In my partners case would you say we are best waiting until the CIFAS fraud marker has been removed along with the missed payments. Would we even be able to see the Fraud marker without submitting a DSAR to CIFAS, or would you say we should be okay to apply once the Victim marker appears on her report as again the lender will see that the missed payments and CIFAS fraud marker (if still present) were not her?