What is Equifax?

Equifax began as a consumer credit reporting business and has grown into a global data and analytics firm. In Australia it operates a local bureau that aggregates data supplied by lenders, utilities, courts and public registers. Its consumer services cover credit reports (accounts, repayment history, defaults and enquiry logs), credit scores, monitoring and alerts when new enquiries, accounts or defaults appear, identity and fraud tools such as alerts and file locks, self-service access to your file and its access log, and dispute channels.

For businesses it supplies credit risk data and scores, real-time decisioning feeds that plug bureau data into application workflows, commercial credit files and payment behaviour data for business lending, analytics for collections and fraud detection, and portfolio monitoring that flags changes across a lender's book. In 2017 Equifax suffered a major global data breach that prompted regulatory scrutiny and industry-wide improvements in data security and breach response.

Licensed credit providers, including banks, card issuers, lenders and leasing companies, report account openings, limits, balances, repayment history and account status. Telcos and utilities are not credit providers for this purpose, so they can only list a default. Public and court records add bankruptcy notices and judgments, government data adds business registrations and insolvency notices where permitted, and every credit application leaves an enquiry on the file.

Lenders use the data to decide whether to approve credit and on what terms. Models also spot inconsistent identity details or suspicious patterns for fraud detection, aggregated analytics support risk-based pricing and collections, and some pre-approved offers use bureau signals, subject to privacy rules and your consent. The file typically holds account identifiers, payment histories, default listings, enquiry logs and limited identity verification data.

Scores come from proprietary statistical models, so an Equifax score is not interchangeable with another bureau's. The usual factors are payment history, defaults or court judgments, the mix of accounts (cards, mortgages, personal loans), balances against limits, recent enquiries, the length of your credit history and public records. Recent and severe delinquencies weigh more than older minor late payments, and a burst of recent enquiries can signal higher risk.

A score is one input among many: lenders also weigh income, employment, collateral and their own policies. A low score does not automatically mean a decline, and a high score does not mean automatic approval. Business credit ratings and consumer credit scores use different data and models for their different purposes.

You can request your credit report through Equifax's online portal or other authorised channels. A free credit report is available from each credit reporting body every 3 months, and again after a credit refusal or after a correction is made. Check for wrong dates, account numbers, statuses, defaults and enquiries, and gather evidence such as statements, receipts or discharge notices.

To dispute an item, document why it is wrong and lodge it through Equifax's dispute channel with your evidence. A credit reporting body must deal with a correction request within 30 days, a period that can be extended only with your agreement. If the item is corrected, Equifax should notify you and the data provider; if not, you can ask for a statement of dispute to be attached to your file. Unresolved correction or privacy complaints go to the OAIC, and unresolved complaints about a credit provider or a credit reporting body go to AFCA.