Standing isn’t just for Fair Debt Collection Practices Act cases anymore. The Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit has affirmed a lower court’s ruling in a Fair Credit Reporting Act case, upholding that the plaintiff, who alleged a procedural violation by the defendant, lacked constitutional standing.
The background: The plaintiff applied for an entry-level position with the defendant and received a conditional job offer, contingent upon the completion of a background check. During this process, the plaintiff failed to disclose a misdemeanor conviction, which was subsequently discovered through a third-party vendor’s consumer report.
- The defendant provided the plaintiff with an incomplete version of this report, omitting a critical code that indicated the reason the plaintiff was turned down was because he failed to disclose the conviction. Consequently, the defendant revoked the job offer, prompting the plaintiff to file a lawsuit.
- The plaintiff accused the defendant of violating the FCRA by not providing a full copy of the consumer report before taking adverse action.
The ruling: The Sixth Circuit’s decision focused on whether the plaintiff had suffered a concrete injury, which is necessary for constitutional standing. The court determined that the plaintiff’s alleged injury — being denied a full copy of the consumer report — did not constitute a concrete harm applying the standard set in TransUnion v. Ramirez. The court emphasized that a mere procedural violation, without evidence of adverse effects or concrete harm, does not satisfy the requirements for standing.
- The plaintiff argued that the denial of complete information caused confusion and prevented him from adequately addressing the reasons for the job offer’s revocation. However, the court found that the plaintiff failed to demonstrate any tangible adverse effects resulting from the incomplete report. Specifically, the plaintiff could not show that he would have been able to change the outcome of his job application or that the withheld information had any material impact on his subsequent job search.
- The court also rejected the plaintiff’s comparisons to traditional common-law and constitutional harms, such as procedural due process violations, noting that these analogies did not align with the statutory context of the FCRA. Ultimately, the court affirmed the district court’s grant of summary judgment in favor of the defendant, concluding that the plaintiff lacked standing to pursue the lawsuit.
