Can I Sue For Incorrect Credit Reporting?

Consumer litigation lawsuit data is collected by WebRecon for creditor and collection firms.  They track cases on violations of four of the primary consumer credit related statutes: Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA), Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA), Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) and Truth in Lending Act (TILA).

During 2011 the upward trend in consumer litigation lawsuits continued and broke records in the numbers of lawsuits filed. The lawsuits haven’t decreased since they were compiled in 2005.   The majority of the lawsuits are violations of the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act, which were 75 percent of the lawsuits in 2011. The total lawsuits filed in 2011 were 15,771,12,955 in 2010, 10,309 in 2009, 7,189 in 2008 and 5,719 in 2007  The increases were 22 percent, 26 percent, 43 percent, 26 percent and 23 percent respectively.

The states with the most lawsuits in 2011 were California with 1654, Florida with 1146, New York with 1128, Pennsylvania with 940 and New Jersey with 711. Based upon the district courts, the Denver Colorado district court had the most suits filed in 2011 with 658, Philadelphia was next with 634, then Los Angeles with 623, Chicago with 592 and Newark with 486.

FDCPA

The Fair Debt Collection Practices Act governs what collection agencies can do to collect consumer debt.  It prohibits debt collectors from using abusive, unfair or deceptive practices to collect from consumers. The lawsuits for this act totaled 11,811 in 2011, compared to 10,859 in 2010 which was an increase of 9 percent.  The largest increase in lawsuits was during the recession in which the number increased 38 percent between 2007 and 2008, and increased 52 percent between 2008 and 2009.

FCRA

The Fair Credit Reporting Act provides for the accuracy, fairness and privacy of information of files at consumer reporting agencies.  Fair Credit Reporting Act violations totaled 1,838 in 2011 compared to 1,295 in 2019, which was a 42 percent increase.

TCPA

Telephone Consumer Protection Act governs the conduct of phone solicitations and restricts the use of auto dialing, prerecorded voice messages, fax machines and text messages. This law mainly applies to calling and not harassment. There were 272 lawsuits in 2010, which jumped to 660 in 2011 or 143 percent!

TILA

The Truth-in-Lending Act requires disclosure about credit terms and how they are calculated. It provides consumers the right to cancel certain transactions and timely resolution of billing disputes. There were 529 lawsuits in 2010, which increased to 1,462 in 2011 or 176 percent!

Incidentally, I’ve been an expert witness in over 100 of these types of lawsuits.  I can tell you from first hand experience that some of them are valid and some of them are shakedowns.

Credit Expert Witness, John Ulzheimer, is the President of Consumer Education at SmartCredit.com, the credit blogger for Mint.com, and a Contributor for the National Foundation for Credit Counseling.  He is an expert on credit reporting, credit scoring and identity theft. Formerly of FICO, Equifax and Credit.com, John is the only recognized credit expert who actually comes from the credit industry.  Follow him on Twitter here.

Categorised in: Credit Cards, Credit Report, Credit Score, Money & Identity

This post was written by John Ulzheimer