Law Articles

Return to Law Dictionary Index

California Notification of Rights on your Credit Report

California Notification of Rights
You have the right to obtain a copy of your credit report. The fee is $8. There is no fee if you have been turned down for credit, employment, insurance, or rental housing because of information in your credit report within the last 60 days. The credit reporting agency (CRA) must assist you if you need help interpreting your report. You have a right to dispute inaccurate information; however, neither you nor any credit repair company or credit service organization has the right to have accurate, current, and verifiable information removed from your credit report. Under the federal Fair Credit Reporting Act, the CRA must remove accurate, negative information from your report only if it is more than seven years old (bankruptcies and unpaid tax liens may remain on your file for up to 10 years). If you notify the CRA that you dispute the accuracy of information in your report, they must then investigate within 30 business days and modify or remove inaccurate information at no charge. Provide all pertinent information to the CRA, and copies of documents that prove your claim. If an investigation does not resolve the dispute to your satisfaction, you may request that a brief statement be added to your file explaining why you think the information is inaccurate. You also may contact the credit grantor directly to dispute the information. You have a right to receive a record of all inquiries relating to a credit transaction initiated during the 12 months preceding your request.

You have a right to bring civil action against anyone, including a CRA, who improperly obtains access to your file, knowingly or willfully misuses file data, or fails to correct inaccurate data.

You may request that the information in your file not be provided to a third party for marketing purposes by contacting 1 888 5OPTOUT (1 888 567 8688).

You have a right to place a fraud security alert on your credit report that alerts anyone who reviews your credit information that your identity may have been used without your consent.

Recipients of your credit report are required to take reasonable steps, including contacting you at your telephone number if you provided one with your fraud alert, to verify your identity prior to lending money, extending credit, or completing the purchase, lease, or rental of goods or services. The alert may prevent credit, loans, and services from being approved in your name without your consent. However, the alert may delay or interfere with the timely approval of any subsequent request or application you make regarding a new loan, credit, mortgage, insurance, rental housing, employment, investment, license, cellular phone, utilities, digital signature, Internet credit card transactions, or other services, including extension of credit or services at point of sale.

You have a right to obtain a free copy of your credit report at the conclusion of the 90-day alert period by renewing your alert. You have a right to place a "security freeze" on your credit report, which will prohibit a CRA from releasing any information in your credit report without your express authorization, except to those with whom you have an existing account or a collection agency acting on behalf of the account, for purposes of reviewing (account maintenance, monitoring, credit line increases and account upgrades and enhancements) or collecting the account. A security freeze is designed to prevent credit, loans, and services from being approved in your name without your consent; however, using a security freeze may delay, interfere with, or prohibit the timely approval of subsequent requests or applications regarding a new loan, credit, mortgage, insurance, government services or payments, rental housing, employment, investment, license, cellular phone, utilities, digital signature, Internet credit card transaction, or other services, including extension of credit or services at point of sale.

The fee for placing a security freeze on a credit report is $10. If you are a victim of identity theft and submit a valid police report or Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) investigative report, the fee will be waived. A request for a security freeze must be sent to the credit agency via certified mail. A confirmation notice will be sent once the security freeze has been added, and you will be given a personal identification number that will be required to temporarily or permanently remove the freeze. To temporarily remove a security freeze for a specific party, provide your personal identification number to the party you wish to grant access to your report.

A freeze must be removed within three days after we receive your request. If you move to a state that has not legislated security freezes, notify the credit agencies in writing to permanently remove the freeze. If you move to a new address within your state or to another state that has legislated security freezes and wish to keep the security freeze on your file, submit one copy of a government issued identification card, such as a driver's license, state ID card, military ID card, etc., and one copy of a utility bill, bank or insurance statement, etc. Make sure that each copy is legible (enlarge if necessary), displays your name and current mailing address, and the date of issue (statement dates must be recent). We are unable to accept credit card statements, voided checks, lease agreements, magazine subscriptions or postal service forwarding orders as proof. Send copies of any documents you wish to provide to us and always retain your original documents. Be sure to include the following identification information: your full name including middle initial (and generation such as JR, SR, II, III), previous addresses for the past two years, Social Security number, and date of birth.

If you are a victim of identity theft and provide a copy of a valid police report or a valid DMV investigative report, you have the right to request:

• that any information listed on the report as allegedly fraudulent be blocked so that it cannot be reported. Information may be unblocked due to material misrepresentation of the facts, or if you agree that the information is blocked in error, or if you knowingly obtained possession of goods, services, or moneys as a result of the blocked transactions. The CRA must promptly notify you if the information is unblocked.
• one free copy of your credit report each month for up to 12 consecutive months following the date of the police or DMV investigative report.

Mail your request to P.O. Box 9554, Allen, TX 75013. Please send us one copy of a government issued identification card, such as a driver's license, state ID card, military ID card, etc., and one copy of a utility bill, bank or insurance statement, etc. Make sure that each copy is legible (enlarge if necessary), displays your name and current mailing address, and the date of issue (statement dates must be recent). We are unable to accept credit card statements, voided checks, lease agreements, magazine subscriptions or postal service forwarding orders as proof. To protect your personal identification information, Send copies of any documents you wish to provide to us and always retain your original documents. Be sure to include the following identification information: your full name including middle initial (and generation such as JR, SR, II, III), previous addresses for the past two years, Social Security number, and date of birth. To renew a security alert or to request a free credit report at the conclusion of the security alert, include the date the alert was added and your credit report number. To add a security freeze, include payment or a copy of a police report or DMV investigative report. To permanently remove a security freeze, include your personal identification number.

California notice of your rights to request and obtain your credit score
You have the right to request and obtain your credit score.

A credit score is a numerical value or a categorization derived from a statistical tool or modeling system used by a person who makes or arranges a loan to predict the likelihood of certain credit behaviors, including default. The numerical value or the categorization derived from this analysis may also be referred to as a "risk predictor" or "risk score". "Credit score" does not include any mortgage score or rating of an automated underwriting system that considers one or more factors in addition to credit information, including, but not limited to, the loan to value ratio, the amount of down payment, or a consumer's financial assets. "Credit score" does not include other elements of the underwriting process or underwriting decision.

Your credit score report must contain:

• Your current credit score or your most recent credit score that was previously calculated for a purpose related to the extension of credit
• The range of possible credit scores under the model used
• All the key factors (up to four) that adversely affected your credit score, listed in the order of their importance based on their effect on the credit score
• The date the credit score was created
• The name of the person or entity that provided the credit score or credit file upon which the credit score was created



Return to Banking

Return to Law Dictionary Index