Reported difficulties getting help on Equifax's phone lines
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Reported difficulties getting help on Equifax's phone lines
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Re: Reported difficulties getting help on Equifax's phone lines
#2I am tempted to say I am appalled by the utter disregard these credit reporting agencies have for consumers, but I am not really surprised. Coming from a country with a tradition of public institutions, it is amazing to see private credit reporting agencies in US, because this should be a public service from the Government.
Re: Reported difficulties getting help on Equifax's phone lines
#3Because I hate these clickbait titles: the author plays phone-go-round, calls four numbers, waits on hold a bunch, gets disconnected, and eventually gets transferred to an "agent" that ends up being a busy tone.
All that was accomplished was that he placed an automated fraud alert, even though his original question was whether or not he was affected by the Equifax breach.
Re: Reported difficulties getting help on Equifax's phone lines
#4Let me save you a click:
Different agents on different hotlines bounced him around.
After 30+ minutes, an automated system took his SSN and signed him for a trial. Sort of.
Because they kept getting disconnected from the system, they aren't sure if it actually worked.
Seems Equifax is using the "plug fingers in ears and scream la la la la la" method.
Re: Reported difficulties getting help on Equifax's phone lines
#5TL;DR: Equifax phone lines unhelpful for anything.
Suggestion, from https://www.reddit.com/r/personalfinance/comments/6yv4gb/off...
If you do nothing else, place an initial 90 day fraud alert on your file. This is free and will require lenders to contact you if someone (including yourself) tries to apply for credit. Government info. You only have to do this with one bureau in order for the alert to be placed on all three, and it should take less than 5 minutes:
Equifax https://www.alerts.equifax.com/AutoFraud_Online/jsp/fraudAle...
Experian https://www.experian.com/fraud/center.html
Transunion https://www.transunion.com/fraud-victim-resource/place-fraud...
Re: Reported difficulties getting help on Equifax's phone lines
#6I am tempted to say I am appalled by the utter disregard these credit reporting agencies have for consumers, but I am not really surprised. Coming from a country with a tradition of public institutions, it is amazing to see private credit reporting agencies in US, because this should be a public service from the Government.
I can tell you that their attitude towards financial institutions isn't different at the moment. I've spoken to very senior people in several financial institutions recently and most of them are angry that they didn't get any more information than the public and get no help in protecting themselves (and their customers) against fraud. The problem is just that you cannot switch providers within a few days. And even those who didn't use Equifax suffer from the breach.
But be assured that their behaviour isn't much better towards the once paying them.
Re: Reported difficulties getting help on Equifax's phone lines
#7Honestly, I would have expected it to take hours. 42 minutes is actually not too bad, I've been on hold with my ISP for longer than that.
To be fair, he didn't get the answer he was looking for, so this could have dragged on much longer if he persisted in the phone-only route. I actually would have preferred that instead.
Re: Reported difficulties getting help on Equifax's phone lines
#8Please change the title to something along the lines of "Equifax customer service is ineffective"
Re: Reported difficulties getting help on Equifax's phone lines
#9TL;DR: Equifax phone lines unhelpful for anything. Suggestion, from https://www.reddit.com/r/personalfinance/comments/6yv4gb/off... If you do nothing else, place an initial 90 day fraud alert on your file. This is free and will require lenders to contact you if someone (including yourself) tries to apply for credit. Government info. You only have to do this with one bureau in order for the alert to be placed on all t…
Yeah, I just tried to add this via the Equifax link, entered all of my info, and got an instant "the system is down" error.
Edit: Experian displays a grey screen that says "Loading"
Edit: TransUnion requires I set up an account.
Re: Reported difficulties getting help on Equifax's phone lines
#10I called Transunion to freeze my account and they hung up on me. 4 times. I gave up.