Equifax refused to restore his credit score or explain why it dropped to zero, until Go Public started asking questions.
Only then did the company point to its little-known policy: If a credit file sits inactive, the consumer may be labelled “unscoreable” and their score reset to zero. Tregear says the last time he checked, before it disappeared, his score was around a more respectable 700.
Go Public has since found a major flaw in consumer protection rules — that there are no laws or oversight on how credit scores are calculated, leaving credit bureaus to do what they want.
Consumer advocate Geoff White says that gives credit bureaus too much power, with no transparency.
The bank said no credit at all. As if she had never started an account.
You read the article right?
I read the article. Did you? A bad credit rating did not take the account to zero. Poor credit history did not take the account to zero. Bad debt did not take the account to zero. An accounting mistake, or inaccurate credit information did not take the account to zero. Not paying bills on time did not take the account to zero. Defaulting on a loan or credit card did not take the account to zero. A court judgement did not take the credit rating to zero.
The fact that there was NO credit transactions at all, good OR bad, in two years meant the account was deemed ‘unscoreable’ - not good, not bad, not horrible, but non-existent. Absolutely no reportable data to form a credit rating on, for two years.