All credit bureaus and subscribers accepted a code of conduct indicating the responsibilities of the Credit Bureau as custodians of the data and the responsibilities of the individual subscribers. Typically only large companies are subscribers to bureaus as they also make use of them for their credit scoring on order to establish creditworthiness. Some extracts from the code include:
1. Data collection and disclosure notification: Subscribers of credit bureau are encouraged to include a standard notification and consent clause in their credit application form. This clause should notify consumers that personal information and payment behaviour may be accessed from and supplied to a credit bureau for risk management purposes.
2. Duty to supply accurate, correct, up-to-date, relevant and complete data: Subscribers must take reasonable steps to ensure that all data supplied to the credit bureau is accurate, correct, up-to-date, relevant, complete and valid. Information must be supplied within a reasonable time period.
3. Prior notice required before Default listing: Subscribers must give their customers 28 days written notice of their intention to submit default information regarding the customer’s payment performance to the credit bureau. This notification shall be to the customer’s last known address, preferably by registered post.
4. Default listings in respect of prescribed debts: Subscribers shall not submit default information to credit bureau in respect of debts that have prescribed
5. Duplicate Default listings: Subscribers shall not submit default information more than once in respect of the same debt.
Turning to the NCA and section 70 which deals with credit bureaus it is noted that only registered credit providers (section 70(2)) may submit details to the credit bureau upon payment of a submission fee. One must bear in mind that default judgments issued by the Courts are automatically lodged at the relevant credit bureaus. The “bad paying consumer†(payment history) could only be listed if you are a credit provider and a subscriber at the bureau.
With regards to “incidental credit agreements†it would indicate that the company is not registered as a credit provider and therefore the bureau is under no obligation to accept the report (section 70(2)). Should you however reach a stage where you have more than 100 incidental credit agreements, registration as a credit provider will be imminent as required by the NCA and you would then be in a position to lodge your payment profiles of defaulting consumers to the bureau if you are a subscribed member or paid the submission fee.
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