What the hell is going on here? (inquiry weirdness)

[loderunner]

My head hurts. Any feedback is appreciated.

 

TL;DR: House shopping. Credit union claims they have pulled my credit report(s) and received rather bad scores. I can find no evidence of either the pull or a reason for the bad scores.

 

 

Background: My lease is up at the end of January and the goal is to have bought and move into a house by then (it is sooooo much cheaper to buy in my area vs. renting.) I figured I had adequate credit--not great, but no significant bad guys like collections or anything. My credit cards have always had low limits but I never really cared. I never carry a balance and I have a year and a half of student loan payments made on time ($21kish principle.) A credit union recently denied me preapproval with the following blurb:

 

"I reviewed the information on the application and as part of a prequalification , I pulled the credit report. Unfortunately, your credit scores do not meet our minimum requirement of 620. Your scores were Beacon 469, Fair Isaac 571 and Fico 656. We take the middle score for the minimum. At this time you file will be forwarded to our denial department. You will receive a copy of your scores in the mail. You may want to request a copy of your credit report from Equifax."

 

I understood that to mean they used FICO plus two other credit scores with only my Equifax report as input, but another poster here (shifter) has said that Beacon and Fair Isaac are code for Experian and Equifax, so I dunno. I'm curious about this, but at this point it is secondary.

 

Ex and Eq put me through hell re: verifying my identity, but I finally got both paper reports (Ex as my free annual, Eq on the basis of denial of credit.) My annual Transunion report is ~8 months old, so I am disregarding it (but it doesn't have anything worth mentioning.)

 

* Experian lists no inquiries whatsoever.

* Equifax lists only inquiries from "Equifax", :"ND-Equifax", and "AR-Equifax". Equifax and AR-Equifax both have pulls on 11/6, whereas I received the above email on 11/5. Conceivably, there could be some kind of international date line weirdness going on here? That seems to be a bit of a stretch, though. There's no other inquiry anywhere near the timeframe in question.

* I've just now signed up for USAA CCMP. No inquiries listed whatsoever on all three reports.

* Note that I opted out years ago.

* Experian's FAKO gives me 709 for all three reports, which they say is a bit over 43rd percentile. For whatever that's worth.

* The only derogatory thing I can see are two late CC payments, not consecutive, about two years ago. As stated previously, I've been paying my student loan on time for the past year and a half (before that, it was in deferral) and the reports show this.

* The credit union claims to have sent me a letter confirming those scores. I may have tossed it aside (though not in the trash) without opening it, or it may never have come... I can't recall. I plan on tearing the place apart looking for it when I get home.

* Re: identity mixups, I have a fairly unusual name. There is not a single other individual alive with my first, middle and last name--I think I would bet my life on it. I would not quite bet my life, but at least my life's savings, that no one else with my first and last name exists.

* Up until a couple months ago, my credit reports had been frozen for several years.

* Immediately after I unlocked my reports (before the mortgage application), Comcast did a credit check on me and there was some kind of problem that required I go down to the office. The person in online chat said their system uses Equifax but I couldn't get them to be more specific about the nature of the issue. The person at the office frowned a bit, fiddled around for 2 or 3 minutes, and then said "oh!" and did something on his computer and the issue was fixed. I was out the door before I could think to ask what the problem was. ***There is no Equifax inquiry matching this date.***

* I just got approved for Home Depot's sorry-we-really-suck-at-computers credit report freebie thing, but right now I don't see the point in seeing the same story laid out for a third (or rather, the 7th, 8th & 9th) time.

* Equifax made no comment on my claiming denial of credit. I sent them a sharply worded letter because of the runaround they were giving me re: identity verification and they interpreted it as an address dispute and sent me a dispute resolution based on that. (Which is weird because I wasn't trying to remove an address--I was essentially trying to add one.) So I could have received a report for that reason, though I am also due a free annual report from them.

 

 

I just wrote a polite but somewhat sharply worded email to the credit union, but I thought I would ask 'round here before I send it. It's easy to assume a cockup on their end but... this is just too weird. There were apparently/supposedly two people personally overseeing my credit check (I got exasperated earlier about an unrelated red tape issue and complained hard-yet-politely enough that they suddenly started treating me with kid gloves in a way that only potential mortgage customers are treated. And millionaires, one assumes.) How could this have possibly happened? And what about the Comcast thing? I feel like I am missing something and I am too strung out, overworked and sleep deprived (10 month old... still colicky) to figure out what it is.

Edited December 2, 2014 by loderunner

[mizliz1011]

It seems unlikely but could you possibly have a split file where your file goes into two separate files?

[whipster]

Go down to the CU and take a look at whatever they pulled. Maybe they softed you.

[loderunner]

Shouldn't softs show up though? I could have sworn softs were visible to the consumer. And how in the hell could I get 469 with no hint of anything truly bad?

 

(I appreciate the replies; I'm just throwing out counterarguments)

 

 

Actually... erm. Hmm. The ALERT(s) section of my Equifax file says "Legislative Security Freeze in Place". So. Huh. Doesn't say anything about a freeze on my CCMP report, though.

 

My wife was the one who opened the Equifax letter (before promptly losing it) and she absolutely swears every whichway that it was a short letter saying that they accepted the payment and were permanently unfreezing the report as per my request.

 

 

I have no idea what to think. Sending the CU a strongly worded email and I'll pay them a little visit tomorrow at lunch if I have no reply by then.

 

In the meantime, all theories entertained.

Edited December 2, 2014 by loderunner

[cv91915]

Shouldn't softs show up though? I could have sworn softs were visible to the consumer. And how in the hell could I get 469 with no hint of anything truly bad?

 

(I appreciate the replies; I'm just throwing out counterarguments)

 

 

Actually... erm. Hmm. The ALERT(s) section of my Equifax file says "Legislative Security Freeze in Place". So. Huh.

 

My wife was the one who opened the Equifax letter (before promptly losing it) and she absolutely swears every whichway that it was a short letter saying that they accepted the payment and were permanently unfreezing the report as per my request.

 

 

I have no idea what to think. Sending the CU a strongly worded email and I'll pay them a little visit tomorrow at lunch if I have no reply by then.

 

In the meantime, all theories entertained.

 

Maybe they only pulled your wife's credit.

[loderunner]

 

Shouldn't softs show up though? I could have sworn softs were visible to the consumer. And how in the hell could I get 469 with no hint of anything truly bad?

 

(I appreciate the replies; I'm just throwing out counterarguments)

 

 

Actually... erm. Hmm. The ALERT(s) section of my Equifax file says "Legislative Security Freeze in Place". So. Huh.

 

My wife was the one who opened the Equifax letter (before promptly losing it) and she absolutely swears every whichway that it was a short letter saying that they accepted the payment and were permanently unfreezing the report as per my request.

 

 

I have no idea what to think. Sending the CU a strongly worded email and I'll pay them a little visit tomorrow at lunch if I have no reply by then.

 

In the meantime, all theories entertained.

 

Maybe they only pulled your wife's credit.

 

 

No, she has horrendous credit that we cannot afford to fix. She didn't come with me and I've been careful not to mention her or put her name or SSN or anything. Good thought, though.

[loderunner]

New question: can LLCs have credit files? I've got a vaguely plausible theory I'm working on. Might be a happy ending if true, because it should end with simply reminding some people what the two Ls stand for in that acronym.

[mendelssohn]

Beacon is EQ FICO 04, Fair Isaac and FICO are also both FICOs obviously as well. Mortgages use FICO 04 scores, which tend to be lower than FICO 08 because the scores don't go up to 850, and they are less forgiving to old, negative accounts.

 

You need more information from the CU, but I'm sure they looked at all 3 with FICO 04.

[loderunner]

Ahhhh, I'd almost forgotten how cathartic this could be.

Yesterday I sent them a lengthy, nicely laid out (in bullets) email explaining the situation, and I just received a canned email that suggested I go to annualcreditreport.com and find a credit councilor. This canned response was actually from a Vice President I'd previously been in contact with, not from a nameless Customer Service drone.

I'll spare you my entire reply to this (which I forwarded to customer service. If I can find an email address, I'll forward it to legal as well), but here's the coda:

"As an insurance regulator, I deal with bureaucratic errors literally all day long--rest assured, you will not deflect me with canned statements. I advise you drop any haughty pretense of competence, re-read my email, and do as I ask. It will make this a lot easier for all of us."

I love the smell of napalm in the morning.

[mendelssohn]

That kind of attitude isn't going to help.

[loderunner]

That kind of attitude isn't going to help.

 

Making it clear that I'm prepared to sue isn't going to help? I disagree. It's done wonders for me in the past.

 

This is the second bureaucratic F-up this VP has dealt me (first one is unrelated--essentially, they lost my mortgage application and kept me on the hook for nearly a month), and this time he's decided to not even bother reading my initial polite response.

 

You'll attract more flies with (certain kinds of) vingear than honey. It's a proven fact.

Edited December 3, 2014 by loderunner

[548ficoNtexas]

I'm confused but what are you going to sue him for?

[mendelssohn]

Beacon is EQ FICO 04, Fair Isaac and FICO are also both FICOs obviously as well. Mortgages use FICO 04 scores, which tend to be lower than FICO 08 because the scores don't go up to 850, and they are less forgiving to old, negative accounts.

 

You need more information from the CU, but I'm sure they looked at all 3 with FICO 04.

You weren't even sure these were all FICOs, which they are.

 

Threatening to sue is ridiculous at this point.

[ManofB]

On what basis would you be suing?

[loderunner]

I'm confused but what are you going to sue him for?

 

Telling me that those were my credit scores when, in fact, no credit inquiry was made? I have less than two months now to get preapproved and buy a house (our lease is up in Jan), and the houses at the top of our list have already been sold.

 

The issue might be somewhere else along the line (split file, or perhaps an LLC I was connected to at one point popping up) but there aren't any obvious explanations, and it's worth noting that they claimed to be sending me snail mail verification of my scores, but it never arrived. It's entirely conceivable those are someone else's scores, but even if they aren't i do expect them to do a little basic investigation and explain in detail the steps they took.

[loderunner]

 

Beacon is EQ FICO 04, Fair Isaac and FICO are also both FICOs obviously as well. Mortgages use FICO 04 scores, which tend to be lower than FICO 08 because the scores don't go up to 850, and they are less forgiving to old, negative accounts.

 

You need more information from the CU, but I'm sure they looked at all 3 with FICO 04.

You weren't even sure these were all FICOs, which they are.

 

Threatening to sue is ridiculous at this point.

 

 

The VP wasn't even "sure" of that. He just claimed that Equifax is the only CRA they use.

 

Rent is costing me 3x what mortgage payments were, I and my baby and my wife are am being kept up at night by noisy college students in our crummy apartment, at this rate we're going to have to either have to pay a fortune in weekly hotel rates or sign another lease when our current lease is up in Jan, and several dream homes have been snatched from under our nose. You somehow think that their providing me with erroneous credit scores is not worth suing?

 

If someone has an explanation for why inquires wouldn't be showing up on any of the credit reports, I am listening. That is, in fact, why I posted here before contacting the credit union.

Edited December 3, 2014 by loderunner

[ManofB]

You could always purchase your scores from myfico. They arent 04, but would at least give you a measuring stick vs what the CU is saying

[548ficoNtexas]

 

I'm confused but what are you going to sue him for?

 

Telling me that those were my credit scores when, in fact, no credit inquiry was made? I have less than two months now to get preapproved and buy a house (our lease is up in Jan), and the houses at the top of our list have already been sold.

 

The issue might be somewhere else along the line (split file, or perhaps an LLC I was connected to at one point popping up) but there aren't any obvious explanations, and it's worth noting that they claimed to be sending me snail mail verification of my scores, but it never arrived. It's entirely conceivable those are someone else's scores, but even if they aren't i do expect them to do a little basic

investigation and explain in detail the steps they took.

If you already have a banking relationship with them it's possible they did a soft pull and you weren't qualified. I would get paper reports from all three and see what is showing, not a third party. With those scores you won't be able to get a mortgage, even FHA at this point. You need to find out what's bringing you scores down.

[mendelssohn]

You said your wife threw out the piece of paper with the scores, correct? Ask for another copy. They obviously provided you with information, but you are overlooking your responsability with this piece of paper.

 

Sounds like an amateur CU. I'd start looking elsewhere for a mortgage.

 

If thise are your scores, you're not mortgage ready.

Edited December 3, 2014 by mendelssohn

[ManofB]

I'd be focusing on the scores, not so much the inquiries (or lack their of) at this point.

[loderunner]

 

 

I'm confused but what are you going to sue him for?

Telling me that those were my credit scores when, in fact, no credit inquiry was made? I have less than two months now to get preapproved and buy a house (our lease is up in Jan), and the houses at the top of our list have already been sold.

 

The issue might be somewhere else along the line (split file, or perhaps an LLC I was connected to at one point popping up) but there aren't any obvious explanations, and it's worth noting that they claimed to be sending me snail mail verification of my scores, but it never arrived. It's entirely conceivable those are someone else's scores, but even if they aren't i do expect them to do a little basic

investigation and explain in detail the steps they took.

If you already have a banking relationship with them it's possible they did a soft pull and you weren't qualified. I would get paper reports from all three and see what is showing, not a third party. With those scores you won't be able to get a mortgage, even FHA at this point. You need to find out what's bringing you scores down.

 

 

 

You said your wife threw out the piece of paper with the scores, correct? Ask for another copy. They obviously provided you with information, but you are overlooking your responsability with this piece of paper.

 

Sounds like an amateur CU. I'd start looking elsewhere for a mortgage.

 

No, she lost a piece of paper from Equifax saying that my security freeze had been lifted. We just located that piece of paper this morning and verified that it was, in fact, lifted. However, the credit report they sent me 1-2 months later says "Legislative Security Freeze in Place", whereas CCMP makes no reference to a security freeze. Maybe this is a sign that some kind of multiple file issue is going on here?

[loderunner]

 

If you already have a banking relationship with them it's possible they did a soft pull and you weren't qualified. I would get paper reports from all three and see what is showing, not a third party. With those scores you won't be able to get a mortgage, even FHA at this point. You need to find out what's bringing you scores down.

 

 

Maybe I just suck at summarizing stuff. Like I've said all along, I have recent paper reports from Ex and Eq (I don't yet feel like paying for a paper TU report, though I guess I could.) Neither one shows any inquries (except for Equifax self-inquiries.) CCMP also shows no inquiries for all three.

 

Do soft inquiries not show up? I could have sworn they did.

 

Like I said, I have poured through all three credit reports and there is nothing other than two 30 day late CC payments, two years ago. No balances are carried for more than a month or two. You're telling me that explains a score of 469?

[ManofB]

CCMP doesnt show the security freezes from me, whether self generated or generated by any of the CRA's. I'd get copies of your paper reports on order, and I would also drop the $50+ bucks on the tri report with scores from myfico (will at least give you an instant shot of your scores, and anything strange on your credit report). I would also being looking into someone else for the mortgage.

[548ficoNtexas]

CCMP doesnt show the security freezes from me, whether self generated or generated by any of the CRA's. I'd get copies of your paper reports on order, and I would also drop the $50+ bucks on the tri report with scores from myfico (will at least give you an instant shot of your scores, and anything strange on your credit report). I would also being looking into someone else for the mortgage.

^^^^ this! I still don't see a "cause of action" for a lawsuit.

[loderunner]

CCMP doesnt show the security freezes from me, whether self generated or generated by any of the CRA's. I'd get copies of your paper reports on order, and I would also drop the $50+ bucks on the tri report with scores from myfico (will at least give you an instant shot of your scores, and anything strange on your credit report). I would also being looking into someone else for the mortgage.

 

Again again again AGAIN, I have paper reports for Equifax and Experian, post-denial. I'll round it out with TU, sure, but I don't think I should wait another week or two just for that.

 

I will do my own FICOs just as soon as I get someone from the credit union to verify that they did actually pull my credit report. The fact that no inquiries showed up AND THAT I NEVER RECEIVED SNAIL MAIL CONFIRMATION OF MY SCORES LIKE THEY SAID I WOULD seems rather suspicious.