Financial institutions may take a while to process disputes with credit bureaus, so your credit score may not immediately reflect the corrections you make in your credit report. Learn more.
In assessing a borrower's creditworthiness, four major licensed credit bureaus—CIBIL, Equifax, Experian, and CRIF High Mark—play a pivotal role in India. These bureaus craft credit scores from an individual's credit history, payment tendencies, and borrowing habits. It typically draws from 36 months of a person's credit history. With credit scores spanning 300 to 900, a score of 700 or higher is considered optimal for loan and credit card approvals.
A low score can significantly impact one's financial prospects, like availing a loan.
Highlighting the menace of credit score inaccuracies, Priyonko Das, a resident of Bengaluru, shared his predicament on Facebook. He alleged that his CIBIL score plummeted 60 points due to erroneous monthly EMI data from his bank to the CIBIL Bureau. While Das resolved this issue with the bank, his credit score did not rebound as anticipated. He sought advice from the group on rectifying his CIBIL score.
"After a long two months email fight, they (the bank) have finally corrected the report with Cibil, which is reflected in the latest report, but surprisingly my score did not increase," Das said.
Users in the comments section echoed similar experiences. Tushar Gupta, a Maharashtra resident, alleged his car loan processing fee was mis-categorised as overdue, causing an 80-point credit score dip. While several users on social media asked to wait for two months for score improvements, Let's see what Cibil has to say about this.
Getting Your Credit Score Corrected & Turn Around Time
TransUnion CIBIL Limited is a credit information company operating in India that maintains records of individuals' loan and credit card payments based on monthly submissions from banks and lenders.
The CIBIL website informs users that they can initiate disputes online free of charge to address inaccuracies, account ownership and duplication of information in their credit report.
The process to initiate disputes are as follows:
Log in to myCIBIL.
Navigate to the Credit Reports section
Select the relevant subsection and click "Raise a Dispute."
Fill out the online dispute form.
Identify the disputed section.
Submit the form after providing the necessary details.
"You can dispute multiple fields and information on your report in a single dispute by navigating each section of the report (i.e. Personal, Contact, Employment, Account Details and Enquiry)," the website says.
Now CIBIL will do the following process:
Disputed fields within relevant sections are marked as "Under Dispute."
Depending on the nature of the dispute, it is taken up with the concerned bank or financial institution.
The bank or financial institution assesses and either accepts or rejects the dispute.
If accepted, corrections are implemented, and the "Under Dispute" label is removed.
CIBIL promises a turnaround time of 30 days, subject to the bank or financial institution's processing time.