What to do if you have been taken on credit?

If you find out you’ve been taken out on a loan without your knowledge it doesn’t mean you have to pay. It’s possible to prove you weren’t involved. Roskachevo gives advice on what to do to get a bank to write off someone else’s debt.

What to do if a debt collector calls you and informs you about a credit debt?

If you become overdue on a loan, a credit organization or a collection agency will call you. Finding out about a loan debt you’re hearing about for the first time can be frustrating, but it would be a big mistake not to respond to the calls and try to find out what happened. The fact is that the loan, drawn on your name by crooks, may be quite small, but the interest is accrued huge, and ignoring the situation will lead to an even greater debt and exacerbate the problem. So you need to find out which organization they are calling from, what credit they are referring to, and when it was taken.

The information you received should be checked in credit bureaus. If your credit history is clean, you may very well have received a scare call from an unscrupulous person, and not from a collection agency at all. However, there can be another scenario: there is not just one loan in your name that you were called about, but several at the same time from different organizations. Often there is a delay in getting the information to the BCI.

If you find out that you do have a credit on your name, what do you do??

1.File a report with the police

It will give your problem legal status and officially confirm your status as a victim of fraud. It will also help if the case goes to court. You may know about one loan, but later there may be other loans, made by swindlers on your name. And if you discover that you took credits with the stolen or lost passport you should also write a statement about the theft loss of the passport. The document will be considered lost and you will not be able to apply for another loan in the future.

2. Write a claim to the bank or the MFO where the credit was issued in your name

Already from your credit history you will know when the credit was taken, the amount of credit and the amount of penalty, as well as the period of overdue payments. The creditor must be told in the application:

• About the absence of a contract with you

• About not receiving money from the bank/ MFI

3. You should demand to make an internal investigation and have your debt written off. The lending institution can provide you with the documents that were used to make the loan. They will tell you which method the fraudsters used. This can be passport details, passport scans, document signatures, phone numbers and credit card.

If you see that the photo in your passport is pasted over, the signature is forged, and the card and phone numbers are not yours, it proves that it was crooks who took the loan. You can also ask the bank about this information to make sure that you are not the person who took the loan. After the investigation, if the lender realizes that it was not you who took the money, the case should be closed and your debt written off.

But what if the bank does not recognize the fraudulent actions? When it is worth going to court?

It is not profitable for banks and MFOs to write off debts they will never get back. You may not be able to have your debts written off. Then you need to complain to the regulator, to the online reception of the Bank of America, and describe the situation with the investigation of your case.

If all of the above methods have not helped and the credit institution refuses to write-off the debt, you have to apply to the court with a claim. The statement of claim against the creditor must be accompanied by the entire set of documents on the contract and evidence that the contract was not made by you.

What can prove your innocence to the credit?

• Forged signature: You may need graphological handwriting expertise to determine if it is a forgery.

• Your whereabouts: If you can prove you were not at the office of the credit organization when the credit was given, it will be a substantial proof that you didn’t take the credit. You could be in another city, at work, on vacation in another country.

• A statement from the police: for example, that your passport was stolen or that your account with personal data was hacked

• Surveillance tapes: If the case is recent, the bank may find the camera recordings of the day someone under your name visited the office of the credit institution and took a loan

• Account statements: this will help prove that no amount has ever been charged to your account.

If the loan was issued online, it may be harder to collect evidence, but it is possible. You will need to bring evidence that your account was hacked, for example, on Gosuslugi.

The decision in your favor on debt forgiveness will depend on the age of the fraudulent loan and all the details of the situation. Sometimes the debt is written off by the bank itself when you apply, sometimes you have to fight for debt write-off in court. According to experts, it is easier to win the case against the MFI than against the bank, because you will have to dispute less documents.

If you won the court case and your credit was forgiven, do not forget to apply to the BCI to “clear” your credit history: the financial institution must delete information about you as a bad borrower.

What to do if a loan was taken using a stolen or lost phone?

If the phone was stolen or lost, and the theft was noticed too late, the fraudsters might have time not only to withdraw money from the card to other accounts, but also to take out loans and withdraw them to their cards or cash them out. This can be done with a bank app or with a SIM card. That’s why banks recommend when you lose your cell phone: block the SIM card

Inform the bank about the loss to block access to the personal account. However, if this is not done promptly, the abusers can still manage to take out a loan and withdraw funds, and you will have to repay the credit. In this case you also need to write a police report on fraud, and if the phone was stolen, also on the theft of the mobile device. Money is almost always withdrawn to fraudulent cards, and the police rarely find the real culprits.

Proving your innocence in such a case is very difficult. Banks state in the agreement with the client that “the Holder is responsible for all card transactions made before the bank received notification of the loss of the Mobile Device”. Courts almost always side with the bank, since all loan and withdrawal transactions were performed with confirmation via mobile device, sms-codes, etc.d. Litigation with the bank may cost serious investment in legal help, and a positive result is not guaranteed, and the total cost may exceed even the amount of the loan taken out.

Igor Pozdnyakov, legal counsel at the consumer rights protection department of Roskachevo:

“If you are faced with the situation described above, it is not recommended to pay someone else’s debt without trying to assert your rights. Even if the credit organization rejected your claim, you have the inalienable right to apply to court to protect your rights – often when there is evidence that you are not the borrower, the contract is recognized as not concluded, and the obligation to pay anything is disappeared. If the court takes the side of the credit institution, then, unfortunately, you will most likely have to repay the “other people’s” debt.