A District Court judge in Louisiana has dismissed a Fair Credit Reporting Act lawsuit against a credit reporting agency, ruling that the plaintiff never alleged what was actually wrong with the information in his file, only that he had disputed it.
The background: The case grew out of a series of written disputes the plaintiff sent to the defendant about his consumer report.
- Last spring, the plaintiff mailed a dispute by certified mail, followed by additional written disputes in June and August. He included a copy of his passport, proof of address, the last four digits of his Social Security number, and his full date of birth.
- The disputes covered four addresses he said were not associated with him, two telephone numbers he said were not his, relationship information identifying another individual as a spouse or co-applicant, hard inquiries he said he had not authorized, and what he described as certain negative tradelines that were inaccurate or unverifiable.
- Some disputed tradelines were later modified or removed while other disputed information continued to be reported. The plaintiff said the reporting cost him time and money and caused emotional distress, including the denial of probate bond applications.
- The plaintiff, representing himself, sued this spring under Sections 1681i and 1681e(b) of the FCRA, then amended his complaint after the defendant moved to dismiss.
- The defendant argued that inaccurate addresses, telephone numbers, and relationships “are simply not actionable” and that the plaintiff was using “disputed” as a stand-in for “inaccurate,” even though the two words are not synonyms. The plaintiff argued that at the pleading stage he was not required to prove inaccuracy, only to allege facts supporting a plausible inference of it.
The ruling: Judge Greg Gerard Guidry of the District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana granted the motion to dismiss, holding that an actual inaccuracy is a threshold requirement under both sections of the FCRA and that the amended complaint never cleared that bar.
- Personal identifying information such as addresses, phone numbers, and relationship data is generally nonactionable “header information” because it “does not typically have any bearing on a consumer’s creditworthiness,” Judge Guidry wrote. The plaintiff alleged no facts showing that information bore on his credit standing or eligibility for credit, insurance, or employment.
- The reference to certain negative tradelines was conclusory. The plaintiff did not identify which tradelines were at issue, which furnisher supplied the information, what the particular inaccuracy was, or why the information was wrong.
- On the hard inquiries, the plaintiff named two of them but alleged only that he had not authorized them. That, standing alone, did not let the judge infer that the defendant reported them inaccurately. A broad assertion of inaccuracy without an explanation of why the information is wrong “reflects only a subjective belief insufficient to support an FCRA claim.”
- With no substantive violation pled, the claim for willful noncompliance under Section 1681n failed as well.
- Judge Guidry dismissed the claims without prejudice and gave the plaintiff 21 days to amend, rejecting the defendant’s argument that further amendment would be futile because the plaintiff had not yet been given notice of his pleading deficiencies.
