Lawsuit Attempts to Expose Experian's Sloppy Handling of Consumer Disputes And Consumer Personal Information
MONTROSE, Calif., May 20, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- Hannah Weinstein battled false information on her credit report for months before finally filing — with help from the Law Offices of Robert F. Brennan — a lawsuit against Experian and Fidelity Creditor Services as a last resort. Little did she know that Experian had taken her dispute letters and documents—which included all of her private personal identifying information--and shipped them off to a foreign corporation in Santiago, Chile for processing. There, an Experian dispute operator, for whom English is a second language and who received no training in interpreting American legal documents, processed Ms. Weinstein's dispute among 90 other disputes she processes every day, averaging a dispute every five minutes. The deposition of the Experian dispute operator in Chile can be found using this link: Experian dispute deposition videos.
Ms. Weinstein has alleged that Experian and Fidelity violated two separate provisions of the Fair Credit Reporting Act which require consumer reporting agencies and data furnishers to "follow reasonable procedures to assure maximum possible accuracy" and to conduct "a reasonable reinvestigation" of disputed credit items. Weinstein maintains that her dispute was not given a reasonable investigation by Experian and Fidelity, and that the procedures Experian and Fidelity followed were shoddy and heavily biased in favor of the debt collector, Fidelity, instead of Ms. Weinstein.
Experian and Fidelity both recently filed motions to have the case tossed out of court. The distinguished attorney, Robert F. Brennan, of the Law Offices of Robert F. Brennan APC in Montrose, Ca., represented Weinstein before the honorable Dale S. Fischer on May 6, opposing these motions. Judge Fischer ruled in favor of Weinstein, and the case will proceed to trial in August of 2019.
By way of background, Hannah Weinstein was first notified by Fidelity that she owed $9,320.74 in March 2017. This amount allegedly accrued during a rent strike against her landlord, but in subsequent proceedings the landlord agreed that Ms. Weinstein owed no money, and the Los Angeles Superior Court entered an order that Ms. Weinstein's debt was waived. Despite Weinstein requesting Fidelity to drop the alleged debt, Fidelity refused to acknowledge that the debt had been waived and credit-reported the debt to Experian. This destroyed Ms. Weinstein's otherwise blemish-free credit reputation. After multiple dispute letters to both Fidelity and Experian did not result in removing the negative credit entry, Weinstein finally sought legal action as a last resort.
Considering this case's most recent development, Brennan has a positive outlook for the trial of this case, and believes that this case will shed light upon Experian's shoddy practice of entrusting U.S. consumers' information into the hands of foreign corporations whose low-level workers daily handle the sensitive personal information of American consumers.
Case No. 2:17-cv-08704 DSF (JEMx)
Contact
Robert F. Brennan, Esq.
(818) 249-5291
http://www.brennanlaw.com/
[email protected]
SOURCE Law Offices of Robert F. Brennan
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