Hard Inquiry Without Permission: What to Do
If you think that someone’s made a hard inquiry on your credit report without permission, you’ll want to act quickly to make sure that it’s taken care of correctly — it could be a sign of fraud or identity theft.
- Credit inquiries appear on your credit reports any time a potential creditor, landlord, employer or insurer checks your credit history.
- Hard credit inquiries, which can impact your credit score, usually require your written permission. Soft credit inquiries may happen without your consent, but they won’t affect your score.
- You can find a full list of soft and hard credit inquiries run over the last couple of years on your credit report. If you discover a hard inquiry that was made without your permission, you can dispute it and take steps to protect your credit.
Who can check my credit?
Not just anyone can pull your credit reports. The Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) — in conjunction with other laws — was put into place in 1970 and amended over the years in order to protect consumers by limiting who can check your credit report and how they can use that information.
You’re legally entitled to a copy of your credit report in certain situations — for example, if it contains inaccurate information, if someone has taken action against you because of information in your report or if you’re seeking public assistance. You’re also allowed to pull your own credit report for free once per week from each of the three major credit reporting bureaus through the website AnnualCreditReport.com.
Beyond that, lenders, employers, government agencies and others are only allowed to pull your credit report for what are referred to as permissible purposes, which include:
- Reviewing an application for credit
- Reviewing an insurance application
- Determining whether you’re eligible for public assistance
- Employment purposes, but only with your written consent
- Certain business transactions, such as applying to rent an apartment
- Court orders, such as those related to child support
- With your written permission
How do credit inquiries work?
When it comes to pulling your credit report, not all pulls are treated the same. There are hard inquiries and soft inquiries, and both the rules around them and the effect they have on your credit score are very different.
Hard credit inquiries
Hard inquiries typically require your written permission. These occur when you’re applying for a credit card or personal loan, trying to rent an apartment and other situations where a business is attempting to assess your financial health for a specific purpose. They may also occur in certain situations without your permission, such as in response to court orders and child support cases.
Hard inquiries generally stay on your credit report for up to two years and can typically decrease your credit score by up to five points.
If you have a lot of hard inquiries over a short period of time, it could be viewed as a sign that you’re a financial risk because you’re applying for more debt than you can afford. However, if you’re simply shopping around for a specific type of loan and have multiple hard inquiries within a 14- to 45- day window, they are all treated as a single inquiry.
Soft credit inquiries
Soft inquiries may happen without your permission. These inquiries occur when you pull your own credit report and when lenders review your credit for the purposes of preapproving a loan or prescreening you for an offer.
For example, creditors might use a soft inquiry to see if you qualify for certain offers, like the credit card or refinancing letters you get in the mail. Soft credit checks may also occur when employers review your credit or insurance companies need to provide you with a quote.
Soft inquiries can be pulled without your permission, but they don’t affect your credit score.Still, if you’d like to limit soft inquiries, you can use the website OptOutPrescreen.com to opt out of the prescreening process that companies use to send you offers for products like credit cards, mortgage refinancing and insurance.
How to find a hard inquiry without permission
The best way to find unauthorized inquiries is to keep a close eye on your credit report.
Plan to check your credit report from each of the three major credit bureaus at least once per year. Your reports will show any inquiries that have occurred within the last one to two years, and each report may contain different information, as some lenders only report to one or two of the bureaus.
To keep a closer eye on your credit, you can request a copy of your free credit reports as often as once per week, which may make it easier to catch any inquiries made without your consent before too much time passes. You can also enroll in a free credit monitoring service like LendingTree Spring, which tracks your credit score and alerts you of any changes.
Remember that there are legitimate reasons for there to be hard inquiries on your credit report. For example, if you’ve recently applied for a loan or a credit card, those inquiries will show up. As you review your report, you’ll want to think back through your recent activity before deciding that an inquiry happened without your permission.
What to do if you find a hard inquiry without permission
So, what do you do if you find a hard inquiry you didn’t authorize on your credit report? There are a few steps you can take to protect yourself.
- Contact the company that made the hard inquiry. It’s possible that your credit report was pulled by mistake, so the first step is to check with the company that pulled it. You can ask them for proof that you authorized the inquiry; if they can’t provide it, you can then ask them to correct the mistake with the credit reporting agencies.
- If you suspect fraud, protect yourself. You can freeze your credit, which prevents lenders from accessing your credit report and can be lifted at any time. You can also place a fraud alert on your credit report, which makes it harder for someone to open a new line of credit in your name by requiring businesses to verify your identity. Plus, you can report the incident through IdentityTheft.gov — it’s run by the Federal Trade Commission and it’ll help you create a customized plan for dealing with the issue.
- Dispute the unauthorized inquiry. Finally, you can dispute the unauthorized inquiry directly with each credit bureau that’s reporting it (TransUnion, Equifax and Experian). The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau provides instructions and sample letters that you can use to properly identify the issue, explain that you’d like it removed and send that information to the right place.
Frequently asked questions
Hard inquiries can stay on your credit report for up to two years.
Most hard inquiries aren’t a big deal, only reducing your credit score by a few points. However, they can become a bigger issue if you have a lot of hard inquiries in a short period of time or if you have other negative items on your credit report.
If a hard credit inquiry is made without your permission, you may have the right to sue for willful violation of the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA). You should consult with an attorney if you are considering this route.
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