Credit Reports Say He’s Dead

It’s bad enough when you see something unusual on your credit report. But what if you were told that a major credit bureau was reporting you were dead? That’s what one Upstate man says happened to him. He said he’s spent months trying to get a car loan but kept reaching dead ends because he was listed as deceased on his report. We help him get his reports cleared up in this 7 On Your Side Problem Solver.

I applied for a car loan and the creditor told me that when he pulled my report that I was deceased, said Nick Clinkscales. That’s right…dead. Clinkscales says he’s been trying to prove he’s alive to the three credit bureau’s since last year. I sent in letter after letter trying to dispute everything and to no avail nothing happened, said Clinkscales. Then last week Clinkscales was denied for another car loan…you guessed it…a credit report said he was dead.

Unless you can talk to a dead man like she’s the ghost whisperer or something you know I don’t understand that at all. We were unable to get a unanimous answer from the credit bureaus as to why this happened. Both Equifax and Experian said they did have record of Clinkscales as deceased but said they would have the problem resolved.

A TransUnion spokesperson said it did not have him listed as deceased and said his case is a great reminder of the importance of checking all three credit bureau reports to make sure the information matches. So how do you make sure this doesn’t happen to you? An Equifax spokesperson says Clinkscales either had a joint account with or was an authorized user of someone who passed away.

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