After checking my credit report in March this year i discovered i had a CCJ on my credit report.

I knew this could not relate to me as i have never deafulted on any account i have had,

next step i took was to pay the fee for trust online to get the details of the CCJ.

The details showed that the CCJ had been issued by Volkswagon Finance,

i have never had a car on finance i knew it was wrong.

My credit file stated it was for another person with the same name and DOB as myself , apart from he has a middle name and i do not.

Next step sent a SAR to Volkswagon Finance, and this just proves that they do not carry out checks properly, they sent me the SAR request and everything i received was relating to this other person, nothing relating to me at all.

Now i have this other persons bank acc number, sort codes, drivers licence,email address, and every letter/email/court proceedings.

I am now stuck at what to do next with this case so any help would be appreciated.

https://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?488056-Barclays-default-not-mine-!!!&p=5129009#post5129009

https://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?488061-Lloyds-Bank-linking-wrong-information-again-!!!&p=5129027#post5129027

Thanks.

One thing I'm not quite clear about and that is who is responsible for registering the CC J against you. Presumably the CC J was issued against the person with the middle initial. Someone somewhere has acted negligently by ignoring the middle initial and simply registering the CC J against you because you share the same first and last name and date of birth.

I'm not aware that one needs to take positive action to register a CC J. I believe that they are registered automatically after a period of one month has expired without the CC J being settled. What exactly is the mechanism for registering the CC J against a credit file?

One for GDPR BF? Looks like serious breach as VWF provided debtor details to third party, is this a CRA error?

Well there certainly is a serious breach somewhere. The problem is to understand the mechanism of how it all works. The credit reference agencies are so obscure that it is very difficult to understand their role in all of this. Do they simply operate a passive database and then their external subscribers place the records on them? Is it the credit reference agency database which then makes the links between people? Maybe that's how it works. Maybe Volkswagen simply places John Smith on the database and then the database trawls the other John Smiths with a certain number of points of reference and when they find one which has the same date of birth – but no middle initial, the system extrapolates that it is the same person. That could be how it works – although making an assumption about a missing middle initial seems to me to be serious and is asking for trouble. On the other hand, maybe it's not like that at all.

How to find out?

OP apprently has all the details from a SAR, but shouldn't alarm bells have rung regarding different address etc? Or possibly as you suggest OP wasn't in the frame until CRA started their actions.

Hopefully this will clarify how the CRAs work , i have posted here a couple of paragraphs from my letter i received off Experian about Lloyds , i have also attached the full letter for those who have PDF reader, which i would advise reading.

“As we have advised in previous correspondence, the companies who provide the credit reference agencies are the ones who are ultimately responsible for the accuracy of the data they send to those credit reference agencies”

"As previously advised, any instance of Experian providing your address or any other address to a company as a 'POSSIBLE' address for there creditor would have been on the strict understanding that they take the appropriate steps to ensure they have established that their creditor does indeed live at an address before linking them with it"

Thanks.

Experian FOS letter2_1.pdf

Experion FOS letter1_1.pdf

Thank you. Do I gather that there is nothing else outstanding from this company. They have supplied all information/SAR – everything?

If they have then I think that it is time to begin your first formal complaint because it seems to me that if you do have everything, that your file in respect of this company is complete.

Yes this is everything i have from this company and is complete.

Okay in that case I suggest that you begin by making a complaint to the ICO. They may try to say that you should solve it with VW finance first – but you should point out to them the seriousness of what has happened and the fact that there is a data breach. You can tell the ICO that you have informed VW.

I suggest that you set out a letter of complaint and that you let us see it first. It needs to be very simple – bullet pointed – outlining what has happened, its effect on you, and the data breach in that they have supplied you with copies of somebody else's personal data.

Once the letter of complaint is ready then I suggest that you send it off to the ICO with copies – not the originals – of all the documents which you have received from VW.

At the same time, I should also begin a complaint to the FOS. Do this by contacting VW finance and complaining that they have linked a CC J to your credit file and that furthermore they have now reached their obligations under GDPR by providing you with a detailed history of some other person – presumably a customer of theirs.

Tell them that you have already complained to the ICO and remind them that it is their duty to inform the ICO of the breach.

Tell them that you want the matter investigated but ultimately you want to go to the FOS. When you make the complaint to VW you don't need to supply them with the documents – and in fact you can leave it to them to work out what they have supplied you. Don't even give them a list at this point.

When you eventually received the final response and then begin your complaint with the FOS, you can supply the FOS copies of all documents. At some point people will ask you to hand over the originals. You should refuse.

To increase the pressure a little, in your complaint to VW you should point out to them that you are holding onto the documents which have been supplied to you because you will be using them in evidence at the forthcoming legal procedure which you expect you are likely to have to begin.

Apart from the distress here, could you please remind us what other damage or prejudice you think you have suffered as a result of this error.

Received response from ICO regarding this matter and again they dont really seem to care that my data is being breached.

Because i have sorted the matter of having the wrong information removed from my credit file myself they see it as job done.

With regards to the third party information i received they are going to deal with this directly with Volkswagen and have no further dealings with myself as this concerns another person.

So much for this new GDPR, the whole system is a joke.