TransUnion Rental Screening Solutions Inc., alongside its Chicago-based parent company, reached a $15 million settlement with the Federal Trade Commission and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau after failing to deliver accurate tenant screening reports of its consumers.
According to a press release, the inaccurate records violated the Fair Credit Reporting Act and can cripple consumers from accessing employment and housing due to outdated and faulty background information given by the company.
“Americans across the country were put at risk of wrongful housing denials because TransUnion failed to follow the law,” said CFPB Director Rohit Chopra in the statement. “We are ordering TransUnion to cease its yearslong illegal activity, clean up its broken business practices, redress its victims and pay penalties.”
TransUnion is a company that provides background tenant checks on consumers to thousands of rental property owners, employers and other companies looking to screen their potential clients or hires.
Mistake-ridden screen reports provided by TransUnion could misrepresent consumers in the eyes of property owners, hiking up barriers for those looking for housing.
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The company outsourced its investigation on tenant eviction records to third-party providers LexisNexis Risk and Information Analytics Group but failed to confirm if the information gathered was accurate.
The press release detailed a multitude of inaccuracies that TransUnion failed to notice, such as mislabeling monetary amounts associated with evictions and reporting a false number of evictions that a tenant may have.
$11 million of the proposed settlement, which must be approved by a federal court before it is enforced, will be distributed amongst the disenfranchised consumers. The remaining $4 million will be deposited into a civil penalty fine, the press release said.
