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Revision as of 02:33, 23 October 2006

Experian is a business information company. Its principal line of business is consumer credit rating. It also holds other information which enables its clients to make business decisions, for example company records, insurance information, vehicle details and lifestyle data. Experian employs approximately 13,000 worldwide and as of 2005 had clients in 60 countries. It has headquarters in Nottingham in the UK and Costa Mesa in California. According to its website Experian's annual sales exceed $2.2 billion.

On 11 October 2006, Experian was demerged from the British company GUS plc and is listed on the London Stock Exchange under the abbreviation EXPN . The company is also now a part of the prestigious "blue chip" FTSE 100 Index. Its value was estimated as £5.7 billion.

Experian North America

Experian North America's core business is providing consumer credit information to businesses so that they can in turn extend credit to consumers. It is a consumer credit reporting agency, considered one of the 'big three' agencies in the United States. Like its main competitors, TransUnion and Equifax, it has also begun marketing credit reports directly to consumers through its subsidiary Free Credit Report.com. Its databases contain credit information on 215 million consumers in the U.S.

Experian acquired its credit reporting business from TRW in 1995, and it now employs approximately 4500 people in North America. Its annual sales exceed $1.3 billion.

In addition to providing credit reports, it maintains a database of over 450 million vehicles containing title and registration data from North American governments and provides address information for more than 20 billion promotional mail pieces to more than 100 million households every year.

Experian is known for breaking the terms of the national "Do Not Call" list, making unsolicited telephone calls to any number that becomes available to them and ignoring requests to not call again.

Experian handles its credit disputes in its "National Consumer Assistance Center" (NCAC) in Allen, Texas. It is frequently sued for violating the Federal Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) and uses the large national law firm of Jones Day to defend these lawsuits. Its litigation and settlement decisions are made by its in-house attorneys based in California.

Experian provides regional data at National Score Index.com. The website shows average credit scores by region and zipcode as well as various other measures of household debt. The site does not indicate if this is a FICO based credit score, the new Vantage score or some other scoring model.

U.S. Credit Reporting

Experian's credit reporting business, like the other major credit reporting bureaus, is chiefly regulated by the Fair Credit Reporting Act. The Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act signed into law on December 1, 2003, amended the FCRA to require the credit reporting companies to provide consumers with one free copy of their credit report per 12 month period.

Experian North America's recent acquisitions

• ClarityBlue - January 26, 2006
• PriceGrabber.com - December 14, 2005
• Prediction Analytics - October 13, 2005
• Baker Hill - August 31, 2005
• LowerMyBills Inc - May 4, 2005
• Simmons Research - October 14, 2004
• Americas Software Corporation - August 23, 2004
• AutoCount - May 25, 2004
• CheetahMail - March 3, 2004
• Marketswitch - February 11, 2004
• MetaReward - December 16, 2003
• PromiseMark - June 4, 2003

See also

• Credit score
• Identity theft
• Fair Credit Reporting Act

External links

• Experian Web site
• Experian The Sleeping Giant

• Business services companies of the United States
• Companies based in Orange County, California
• Business services companies of the United Kingdom