Lock & Alert 4+

Sign up annoying but I hope it will function properly

I just downloaded and signed up for all three of the credit reporting services’ apps and this is the only one that does not recognize and allow you to use an already existing login on the credit service’s website. Yes, you can create your app specific login with the same user name and password but why make a user enter all their personal info to create a login when they already have an Equifax login? I appreciate that apparent simplify of this app and I hope it will work the next time I need to unfreeze my credit report. But the login should be much simpler if you are already an existing Equifax user.

Deliberate fail

There is really no reason this app should not work flawlessly, but it fails in the most basic way. I set up my account on the Equifax website and froze my credit. Then I downloaded this app so I could unfreeze on the go. The app does not recognize my user name and password that I set up 10 minutes ago. And three incorrect attempts lock me out of my account. I’m sure the developer will respond to this with “hey buddy, give us a call so we can fix this.” Why should I devote my time to fixing your screwed up app? Look at every review for the last year. They all say this problem is persistent. Clearly Equifax doesn’t want people freezing their credit or having any control over their information because it messes with their business model. They should have been put out of business when they allowed the sensitive personal credit information of half the country(!) to be hacked. So forget this app. I’m leaving my credit frozen and if any company uses Equifax I simply won’t give them my business until they switch credit information suppliers.

Update: of course Equifax has separate login credentials for its app and website, that’s the most needlessly complicated possible approach so that’s naturally what Equifax went with. Why in the world would you want your Equifax account time be universally accepted across all platforms? Ease of use? Convenience?

개발자 답변 ,

We’re sorry to hear that. Lock&Alert and Equifax.com accounts are different, so, your login credentials may be different. If you’re still having problems, drop us an email at lockandalert@equifax.com so we can look into it. Include your app store handle, a copy of your app store review and the email you used to set up your Lock & Alert account.

Nothing new to say …

Thanks to Dalton Ames and others for saving me the trouble of writing a review. As Dalton Ames points out, any of us who has wrestled with the Lock and Alert app only to find ourselves forced to call Equifax where we encountered a labyrinth of voice options that don’t apply and repeated assertions of “unusually heavy call volume” (Hint, folks, check the definition of “unusually”; it’s not unusual when it happens all the time.), we’ve already spent more of our time than this is worth.

As others have noted, the app often fails to recognize established and valid passwords from log in to log in — I’m certain of this because I, like many of us, keep my passwords in a password safe; the problem is not on my end. Tonight, I managed to log in three times; each time, I selected the option to enable face recognition. That option has yet to register.

That the developers monitor these reviews and often respond is sweet, but it doesn’t fix the app. All in all, this app is part of a larger pattern of customer service from Equifax that reflects a “Let them eat cake” attitude toward we who are putative customers, but are really without much choice in the matter.