The Federal Trade Commission has reached a settlement with a credit repair company that will require it to pay about $65,000 out of a $6.6 million fine after it was accused of charging customers illegal fees and making unsupported promises that it could boost the credit scores of individuals by as much as 120 points within two to six weeks.
BoostMyScore, LLC and William Airy will be prohibited from selling fake access to another consumer’s credit and from collecting advance fees for credit repair services, according to the terms of the settlement, which must be filed and approved by a District Court judge in Colorado.
A copy of the proposed settlement agreement can be accessed by clicking here.
The defendants were accused of generating $6.6 million in revenue by selling piggybacking services via a one-time flat-rate fee, where individuals would be added as additional authorized users on the accounts of consumers with good credit scores. The defendants charged as much as $4,000 for the service, while never actually checking the credit of its creditors, rendering it unable to guarantee that adding themselves to someone else’s credit accounts would boost their scores. All but $64,863 of the $6,630,678 fine will be suspended because of the defendants’ inability to repay it.
“Good credit isn’t for sale,” said Andrew Smith, Director of the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection, in a statement
