CIFAS complaint: "Consumers have a right to a copy of their credit file under the Consumer Credit Act's provisions, now incorporated into the Data Protection Act 1998 for a statutory fee of £2 as opposed to a subject access request where a fee of £10 is the norm"
Our response: Both the DPR and OFT were initially hesitant about clarifying the different fees when we asked but both eventually agreed that the credit reference companies are required by law to charge £2 to show you your credit reference files. Both confirmed that the law limits the amount you should pay to £2 per company.
But you also have the right serve a £10 subject access rights notice which should show you all the electronic data any company might hold on you.
A subject access rights notice is different to a credit reference record notice. The £10 charge that companies impose for replying to these is entirely voluntary. The law only limits the maximum charge to £10 per request. You could - theoretically - serve a subject access rights notice on any company, including the credit reference agencies and the company could - theoretically - reply to it with data you requested without charging you a cent. There is no law that prevents the credit reference agencies showing you the credit reference information they hold on you for free if you serve a subject access rights notice on them.
So, no-one has to charge you. Some don't. An example is the Bradford & Bingley Building Society. The £10 "norm" is not imposed by Government: it is a "norm" imposed by the companies that CIFAS chooses to do business with.
What CIFAS director 
(Censored due to Cifas's legal threats) is describing is a system whereby you are being charged to inspect and clean data that is potentially damaging to you. Data that - potentially - libels you. Unless you stump up, the data remains "dirty". You may consider this arrangement to be inequitable.
We would prefer to see a system in which the companies that collect personal data take responsibility for ensuring that it is accurate. They ensure that it is accurate by paying the subjects of that data to check it. Where it is found to be libellous, the data collectors pay the subject nominal compensation, say, £2,000.
The costs? Well, According to CIFAS director (Censored due to Cifas's legal threats), CIFAS alone saved the credit industry at least £135,140,000 in 1998. Who knows how much the rest of the credit reference industry saved? But even the £135,140,000 saved because of CIFAS is easily enough to pay every man, woman and child in the country the £2 that we are each currently charged to do check that the credit reference agencies are not libelling us.
Nobody - including us - thinks CIFAS is "bad". Far from it - we think they're helping to keep costs down by beating fraud.
But when these companies get so single-minded that they damage the rest of us - like "DC" in our "There is no problem with CIFAS" link - then they become a problem.
And remember this: we found that CIFAS would not even accept delivery of a subject access rights notice.
Return to summary of Cifas's complaints
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