Equifax corrected its misinformation.
Original: “A hard inquiry is one in which a bank, a landlord, an employer or a potential employer, a mortgage broker, or another creditor or lender accesses your credit file because of a transaction you have initiated.”
Corrected: “A hard inquiry is one in which a bank, a landlord, an a mortgage broker, or another creditor or lender accesses your credit file because of a transaction you have initiated.”
From: Greg Fisher [mailto:greg@creditaccuracy.com]
Sent: Friday, October 01, 2010 1:54 PM
To: Robin Holland, senior vice president, Global Consumer Services, Equifax; Robin Holland, expert, Equifax
Subject: Equifax expert writes about employers’ inquiries
You wrote:
Hard Inquiry: Any request for a copy of your credit file is an inquiry, but a hard inquiry is the only one that can affect your credit score. A hard inquiry is one in which a bank, a landlord, an employer or a potential employer, a mortgage broker, or another creditor or lender accesses your credit file because of a transaction you have initiated.
However, another person writing on your website writes:
Inquiries that do not affect your credit rating include requests from employers, requests from companies making promotional offers, and your own requests to check your credit. These inquiries are viewable only by you.
From: Greg Fisher [mailto:greg@creditscoring.com]
Sent: Tuesday, September 28, 2010 12:36 AM
To: Yuki Noguchi, correspondent, National Desk, NPR
Cc: All Things Considered, NPR; Alicia Shepard, ombudsman, NPR; Alicia Shepard, ombudsman, NPR; Anna Christopher, sr. manager, Media Relations, NPR; Danielle Deabler, sr. manager, Media Relations; Emerson Brown, publicist, Media Relations; NPR Corrections; On the Media, NPR, WNYC
Subject: credit score, employers, NPR, Life After Foreclosure: Coping With Bad Credit
Earlier today, you reported, “Some also say they worry that employers might use damaged credit scores against them in a job interview.”
However, consumer reporting agency Experian states: “Experian’s Employment Insight report includes similar information about loans and credit cards that is listed in the credit report. It does not include year of birth, spouse reference, account number or credit score, which are irrelevant to hiring decisions.”
Equifax, another agency, said, “We do not knowingly provide scores for pre employment screening.”
TransUnion, another agency, testified, “There’s no such thing as a credit score in employment.”
Perhaps some worry because the media keep repeating their worst fears. Please break out of the echo chamber and address the above in your final report in the series. Then, consider one about the echo chamber, itself.
Greg Fisher
The Credit Scoring Site
creditscoring.com
PO Box 342
Dayton, Ohio 45409-0342
[10/1/2010. See update.]
From: Greg Fisher
Sent: Saturday, September 25, 2010 8:17 AM
To: Robin Abcarian, national correspondent, Los Angeles Times
Cc: Deirdre Edgar, readers’ representative, Los Angeles Times
Subject: RE: credit score, employers, Los Angeles Times, presumptuousness
That is not why I am asking. The question is this: Where did you get that information?
Further, if you can’t name a source for what you believed was a fact, then did you just make it up? In other words, how did it happen?
The bigger question (not for you): How did members of Congress, the Federal Reserve and the U.S. Department of the Treasury conclude that employers use credit scores, and what caused the nauseating media trend?
Citizens looking for jobs have enough to worry about, already. They deserve an explanation.
Ah…I see why you are asking: the credit score vs the credit report. I’ll look into running a correction.
It’s a fact that’s been reported on ad nauseum.
You wrote, “That and his ruined credit score, which prospective employers often check.”
Who is your source regarding credit score use by employers?
From: Greg Fisher
Sent: Thursday, September 23, 2010 10:44 PM
To: Bob Hansen, NBC Universal, NBC 7/39 News, San Diego
Cc: Greg Dawson, vice president, News, NBC 7/39, San Diego; tips@nbcsandiego.com; isee@nbcsandiego.com; newsletters@nbcsandiego.com; feedback@nbcsandiego.com; SoundDiego@nbcuni.com; knsd.feedback@nbcuni.com; Gillian M. Lusins, NBC Universal Law Department; Gary Sheffer, Vice President, Communications & Public Affairs, GE
Subject: RE: credit score, employers, NBC, San Diego, KNSD NBC 7/39 II, not so fast
Actually, that document states, “An employment report provides everything a standard credit report would provide. However it doesn’t include your credit score or date of birth.”
You are not the first to try to use that page to attempt to justify a comment about job screening and credit scores. Your page still says, “That score can influence a landlord or a potential employer.” When are you going to change it?
Did you broadcast that story on the public’s airwaves?
Do you know Matt Lauer? What’s his email address? I want his source, too.
Things always happen in threes.
The three national consumer reporting agencies all state that they do not provide credit scores for employment screening. And today, completing a 2010 sweep of the big three networks morning coffee klatches, CBS aired this: “That score is the number one thing merchants look at, you know, employers look at.”
In the print version of the story, CBS business and economics correspondent Rebecca Jarvis has the chance to be more eloquent and to make the point clear, saying, “From your prospective employers to your prospective landlords, most companies will check your credit score in order to gauge their risk.”
Fate is cruel. Cross-promotiong like a good employee, on the air, the correspondent refers to MoneyWatch, a CBS web site. But a MoneyWatch article states the opposite of the information in yesterday’s broadcast. It says: “So for those of you who believe, suspect or insist that a bad credit score will cost you a job, take comfort: That simply is not true.”
Watch “The Early Show” host Harry Smith take it in while Jarvis does the deed:
And with that, The Tiffany Network earned a place in history, and in the next exciting video.
The hilarious part: The segment is titled, “Biggest Credit Card Myths Debunked.”
You wrote, “That score can influence a landlord or a potential employer.”
Who is your source regarding credit score use by employers?
[UPDATE 9/20/2010]
From: Greg Fisher [mailto:greg@creditscoring.com]
Sent: Monday, September 20, 2010 10:55 PM
To: Bob Hansen, NBC Universal, NBC 7/39 News, San Diego
Cc: Greg Dawson, vice president, News, NBC 7/39, San Diego; tips@nbcsandiego.com; isee@nbcsandiego.com; newsletters@nbcsandiego.com; feedback@nbcsandiego.com; SoundDiego@nbcuni.com; knsd.feedback@nbcuni.com; Gillian M. Lusins, NBC Universal Law Department
Subject: RE: credit score, employers, NBC, San Diego, KNSD NBC 7/39 II
Did you just make it up?
Greg Fisher
The Credit Scoring Site
creditscoring.com
PO Box 342
Dayton, Ohio 45409-0342
937-681-3224
From: Greg Fisher [mailto:greg@creditscoring.com]
Sent: Thursday, September 16, 2010 1:21 PM
To: Matt Von Pinnon, editor, The Forum of Fargo-Moorhead
Cc: John Lamb. features writer, The Forum of Fargo-Moorhead; Robert Morast, features editor, The Forum of Fargo-Moorhead; Nicole Dewey, director of publicity, Henry Holt/Metropolitan Books; Ann Burnett, professor, Women and Gender Studies, North Dakota State University; Barbara Ehrenreich
Subject: RE: credit score, employers, the Forum of Fargo-Moorhead, clarification of balderdash you bought
Do you refuse to make a clarification?
What is your journalistic responsibility regarding clarifying accurate quotes of inaccurate or unsubstantiated statements?
From: Greg Fisher, creditscoring.com
Sent: Wednesday, September 15, 2010, 7:21 AM
To: Amy Fontinelle, financial journalist and editor
Subject: credit score, employers, San Francisco Chronicle
You wrote, “Insurance companies, landlords and employers may also look at your credit score to see how financially responsible you are before issuing an insurance policy, renting out an apartment or giving you a job. ”
Who is your source regarding credit score use by employers?
Greg Fisher
The Credit Scoring Site
creditscoring.com
PO Box 342
Dayton, Ohio 45409-0342
Last month, in what seemed like a big scoop over its rival news agencies, the Associated Press reported that, now, 25.5% of Americans have FICO scores below 600. But, the score model in that report is a new score, FICO 8 (BEACON 09), which is not sanctioned by the two big housing finance agencies, nor even the one sold to consumers by the main scoring company. The story stuck. Following questioning by creditscoring.com, FICO (the company) removed FICO (the score) distribution charts from its website.
This month, rival news agency Reuters struck back. On Friday, in her story “Scorning debt, consumers’ credit scores soar,” Helen Chernikoff wrote, “The average credit score rose to 704 in July, a level not seen since the first quarter of 1998, according to data that Equifax Inc (EFX.N), one of the largest U.S. credit bureaus, provided exclusively to Reuters.”
To what score model she refers is unclear. In the article, 850 is the highest score on the scale, but there is no mention of the lowest. So, to the average person, the model might look like the broad-based risk FICO credit bureau score BEACON 5.0 available to consumers at myFICO and required by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
Or, it could be something else.
That is because the consumer reporting agencies play a childish game with numbers, creating credit scores with scales similar to that of the well-known FICO score, 300-850. TransUnion even makes one, called Transrisk, that has exactly the same scale as the FICO–300 to 850. There’s PLUS at Experian (330-830). And, in the case of the company that is subject of the fabulous exclusive Reuters story, there is the Equifax Risk Score 3.0 (280-850).