Every complaint the CFPB forwards to a company is public. We pull the credit-reporting slice every quarter and lay it out straight — how many, about what, against whom, where, and what happened next — with the data underneath so you can check us.
Credit reporting is the most-complained-about financial product in the United States, and it isn’t close: it has led the CFPB’s database every year in this report, and its share keeps growing. Most complaints say the same thing — the information on the report is wrong — and the three national bureaus receive the overwhelming majority. A complaint is an allegation the CFPB forwards, not a finding. But the pattern is the point: the system that scores you is the one people trust least.
| Year | All CFPB complaints | Credit reporting | Share | Credit reporting, proportional bar |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2019 | 277,240 | 138,556 | 50.0% | |
| 2020 | 444,213 | 283,715 | 63.9% | |
| 2021 | 495,939 | 307,538 | 62.0% | |
| 2022 | 800,245 | 604,181 | 75.5% | |
| 2023 | 1,292,049 | 1,046,869 | 81.0% | |
| 2024 | 2,734,269 | 2,365,586 | 86.5% | |
| 2025 | 5,442,974 | 4,810,303 | 88.4% | |
| 2026* | 4,530,327 | 4,118,338 | 90.9% |
* 2026 is year-to-date through August 20, 2026; the CFPB publishes a complaint only after the company responds or 15 days pass, so the most recent weeks are still filling in. Bars are proportional to the credit-reporting count; the largest year is the full bar.
Part of the climb is awareness: the database is more than a decade old, free, and public, and more people and more advocates file through it every year. Part of it is volume: the files keep growing, and so does what can go wrong inside them. The CFPB does not verify the facts alleged in a complaint, so read the table as demand for correction, not as a count of proven errors. Read that way, it is still the loudest signal in consumer finance — and it points at the same place every year: the accuracy of the file.
| Issue (2025) | Complaints | Share |
|---|---|---|
| Incorrect information on your reportInformation belongs to someone else (1,923,762) · Account information incorrect (475,474) · Account status incorrect (251,583) · Personal information incorrect (103,564) | 2,815,219 | 58.5% |
| Improper use of your reportReporting company used your report improperly (847,142) · Credit inquiries on your report that you don't recognize (246,454) · Report provided to employer without your written authorization (4,371) · Received unsolicited financial product or insurance offers after opting out (910) | 1,098,877 | 22.8% |
| Problem with a company's investigation into an existing problemTheir investigation did not fix an error on your report (501,031) · Investigation took more than 30 days (289,243) · Was not notified of investigation status or results (33,377) · Difficulty submitting a dispute or getting information about a dispute over the phone (15,872) | 855,162 | 17.8% |
| Problem with fraud alerts or security freezes | 15,069 | 0.3% |
| Unable to get your credit report or credit scoreOther problem getting your report or credit score (12,483) · Problem getting your free annual credit report (2,366) | 14,849 | 0.3% |
| Credit monitoring or identity theft protection servicesProblem canceling credit monitoring or identify theft protection service (3,276) · Didn't receive services that were advertised (2,237) · Billing dispute for services (1,617) · Problem with product or service terms changing (629) | 7,968 | 0.2% |
Read the first row twice. The single largest complaint in American consumer finance is that a credit report contains information that is wrong — and the largest sub-issue under it is that the information belongs to someone else: a mixed file, a stranger’s account, a fraudster’s. The second row is about a report being pulled or used without a permissible purpose. The third is what happens after a dispute — an investigation that didn’t fix it, or took too long.
Those three rows are the Fair Credit Reporting Act’s three promises, in order: accuracy, permissible purpose, and a reasonable reinvestigation. This is the category the FCRA dispute process exists for, and it is exactly the work The 800 Club’s in-house team does — every item, every round.
| Company (2025) | Complaints | Share |
|---|---|---|
| Equifax | 1,644,975 | 34.2% |
| TransUnion | 1,570,073 | 32.6% |
| Experian | 1,361,887 | 28.3% |
| All other companies | 233,368 | 4.9% |
The concentration is structural, not a scandal: the three national bureaus hold the files, so the complaints about the files land on them. Everyone else — specialty reporting agencies, tenant and employment screeners, the banks and collectors that furnish the data — splits the remainder. The practical reading: when something is wrong on your report, there are three places it can be wrong and three investigations to run.
| State (2025) | Complaints | Share |
|---|---|---|
| Florida | 727,144 | 15.1% |
| Texas | 698,572 | 14.5% |
| California | 440,281 | 9.2% |
| Georgia | 383,474 | 8.0% |
| New York | 266,090 | 5.5% |
| Illinois | 210,125 | 4.4% |
| North Carolina | 173,313 | 3.6% |
| Pennsylvania | 167,073 | 3.5% |
| New Jersey | 149,302 | 3.1% |
| Alabama | 133,984 | 2.8% |
Population explains part of this list but not the order — it doesn’t track state size. Complaint volume also follows awareness, and how much credit a state’s residents apply for. A high count is people checking their files, not a verdict on a state.
| How companies closed them (2025) | Complaints | Share |
|---|---|---|
| Closed with explanation | 2,694,356 | 56.0% |
| Closed with non-monetary relief | 2,112,287 | 43.9% |
| Untimely response | 2,674 | 0.1% |
Companies responded on time to 99.9% of 2025 credit-reporting complaints; 912,757 consumers published a written account with theirs.
“Closed with explanation” is the default: the company answered and stood by the record. “Closed with non-monetary relief” is the row to watch — in credit reporting it usually means something on the file changed. Money almost never changes hands through a complaint; correction does. And companies answer on time almost always. The clock is the one part of this system that reliably works.
A CFPB complaint is not a dispute. The dispute — filed under the FCRA, directly with the bureau — is the process that legally obligates an investigation. The complaint is the escalation for when that process fails or stalls.
Assume errors. The FTC’s own study found one in five consumers had an error on at least one of their three reports, and five percent had one serious enough to change the terms they were offered. Pull all three reports and read them.
The right is yours, free. You can dispute inaccurate information directly with each bureau at no cost, and the bureau has 30 days to reinvestigate. No company can sell you that right, and no company can remove information that is accurate, verifiable, and timely.
Escalate when it fails. If a dispute comes back “verified” and the item is still wrong, the CFPB complaint is the next lane — and it becomes a row in next quarter’s table.
The 800 Club’s in-house team does the record work for clients — every item, all three bureaus, every round — and the free strategy call is where it starts. If you were denied credit, the Denial Debrief decodes the letter for free, in your browser, without uploading it anywhere.
Source. The CFPB Consumer Complaint Database, read through its public API. “Credit reporting” is the product category Credit reporting or other personal consumer reports (named Credit reporting, credit repair services, or other personal consumer reports before 2023); both names are counted.
What a count is. A complaint the CFPB sent to a company for response. The CFPB publishes complaints without verifying the facts alleged. Year means the year the complaint was received; the current year is year-to-date, and because the CFPB publishes a complaint only after the company responds or 15 days pass, the most recent weeks are always undercounted until the next pull. Counts shift slightly as the CFPB processes complaints, so a later pull can differ from an earlier one by a fraction of a percent.
Refresh. Quarterly. The pull date is stamped at the top of this page and inside both files. The CSV is tidy (section, period, key, subkey, count, share); the JSON carries the same numbers with the sub-issue detail.
Cite as: The 800 Club, “Credit Reporting Complaints, By The Numbers,” the800club.com/credit-reporting-complaints. Data: CFPB Consumer Complaint Database. The underlying data is U.S. government public information; this compilation may be reused with attribution and a link.
Because credit reports touch nearly every adult, the files are assembled from thousands of furnishers without the consumer's involvement, and the CFPB's complaint portal is free and public. Most complaints say the information is wrong; the CFPB forwards them without verifying the facts, so the totals measure demand for correction, not proven errors.
No. A dispute is filed directly with Experian, Equifax, or TransUnion under the Fair Credit Reporting Act and legally obligates a reinvestigation, normally within 30 days. A CFPB complaint is an escalation: the CFPB forwards it to the company and publishes the outcome. Dispute first; complain when the dispute fails.
Sometimes. A complaint closed with non-monetary relief usually means the company changed something on the file. But a complaint has no power to force a deletion: only inaccurate, unverifiable, or outdated information can come off, and accurate information stays no matter who complains.
From the CFPB's public Consumer Complaint Database, pulled through its API every quarter. The page shows the pull date, and the CSV and JSON linked on it contain every number shown here.
