Benefit Fraud-Govt to check your personal details to find cheats

[Rupert_Baehr]

I may be wrong (hope I am, actually), but I got the distinct impression -conveyed in no small part by the media over the past year and a bit- that quite a lot of families struggling as a result of the recession have been resorting to, indeed, "building up large lines of credit".

 

Now, again I sumise, probably not so many of these are claiming incapacity benefit, but in view of the above, I would expect the 'credit line figures' to be somewhat biased by current events/circumstances in a lot of cases.

 

I wonder if Experian's statistical modelling takes that into account?

 

A very dangerous precedent, if this goes through. In terms of invasion of privacy, this is much worse, by some orders of magnitude, than anything NuLab put through in the past few years (and I'm really not a NuLab -or just Lab- fan at all!). The likes of Experian have been collating just about everyone's consumption/finance data for years already, whether people ticked the little privacy boxes on forms or not (since they can cross-ref everything to at least a bank/credit card or account number, and that piece of data identifies the account-/cardholder just as surely as an ID card/passport in 99.99% of cases). If the "conduit" to the Gvt opens, this will give Whitehall the kind of individual + searchable information about just about everyone, that any totalitarian state could only ever dream of getting back in the days.

 

When I first went to live in the US, I didn't have an American credit card. I did have an 'Access' card, however.

 

US Card issuers use a simple (but flawed) system to determine whether you need another credit card. Most credit card purchases are processed through Wilmington, Delaware (and that includes your purchases if you use your UK card in the US.)

 

The system divides the number of purchases you make by the number of cards you hold.

 

If you make 10 purchases a month and you have 10 credit cards, you probably don't need another.

 

If you make 10 purchases a month and you have 50 credit cards, you certainly don't need another.

 

If you make 50 purchases a month and you only have one credit card, then you could probably use another and your mail box will usually have an offer from somebody.

 

But if you make about 10 purchases and have Zero credit cards ... everybody in the US will be trying to give you a credit card and your credit rating will be ridiculously high :hihi:

 

I don't owe anybody any money. I don't have a mortgage, my wife's car is paid for as are my bikes. I have a couple of cards I use frequently (and a load that live in a draw gathering dust) and I pay the bills every month.

 

My credit rating seems to vary. - I don't see why. Occasionally - when there's a problem with the rating - I get on to the reporting agency and make a fuss. The usual reason is that they've confused me with somebody else with the same (or a similar) name. Fortunately although it's annoying it hasn't caused me any serious problems. Having had 3 separate errors during the past 2 years, I wouldn't be at all happy to have Experian passing information on my creditworthiness to anybody.

 

HN said "...the credit agencies will be identifying potential fraudsters..." In my experience, they make mistakes. Why should I (or anybody else) have to prove I am innocent in the event that a rating agency screws up?

[happyhippy]

I wouldn't mind so much, but there are powers already in place which allow the Government to look at accounts anyway, should they become subject to scrutiny.

 

Maybe I'm old-fashioned, but I still believe in "innocent before proved guilty".

[happyhippy]

I hope so too. But in this quote they were referring to benefit fraud, which is probably more likely in low income families. People with lots of money who commit fraud are more likely to be tax evaders.

 

I wouldn't be so certain.

[cloudybay]

I wouldn't mind so much, but there are powers already in place which allow the Government to look at accounts anyway, should they become subject to scrutiny.

 

Maybe I'm old-fashioned, but I still believe in "innocent before proved guilty".

 

You mean GMS?

[happyhippy]

You mean GMS?

 

Nope. Not at all.

[HeadingNorth]

I heard that tax fraud costs the country 15x more than benefit fraud.

 

Everybody hears that claim from time to time, but it isn't true.

[cloudybay]

Nope. Not at all.

 

So what do you mean?

[Ms Macbeth]

I wouldn't be so certain.

 

I'm not certain, but surely proportionately less rich people claim benefits? I know Incap Ben/DLA etc aren't means tested, but again being on a low income is usually recognised as one of the reasons for having poor health. And means testing the majority of benefits means normally only those on very low incomes qualify. However, I'm prepared to be proved wrong.

[Tony]

I’m not sure how this will sit with those Libdem supporters on here who argued against the previous Governments intrusion into our personal lives though.

 

That rather depends on whether you think that these necessary activities should be done through joined up background profiling techniques using existing freely available data...

 

... or by actively encouraging neighbour to spy on neighbour and trust no-one but the State because the State says that everyone is a potential criminal who is assumed to be guilty and has to prove their innocence.

 

Orwell is quite clear on this stuff.

[cgksheff]

Everybody hears that claim from time to time, but it isn't true.

 

You might want to have a word with the Attorney General's Office, then:

 

http://www.attorneygeneral.gov.uk/nfa/GuidetoInformation/Documents/NFA_fraud_indicator.pdf