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Your premium went up, or an insurer would not quote you, and nothing has changed about your driving or your house. An insurer may have read a claims history report you have never seen. LexisNexis C.L.U.E. is one of the largest, and it is a consumer report under the FCRA, so you can see it and dispute it.
What a C.L.U.E. Report Contains
C.L.U.E. stands for Comprehensive Loss Underwriting Exchange. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau describes it as a claims information exchange that collects and reports up to seven years of auto insurance claims, and notes that C.L.U.E. and Telematics OnDemand are affiliated with LexisNexis Risk Solutions.
There are separate C.L.U.E. reports for auto and for property. The property report follows the address as well as the person, which is why a claim filed by whoever owned your house before you can surface on a quote for your house.
A typical entry carries the date of loss, the type of loss, the amount paid and the status of the claim. The thing that surprises people most is that an inquiry or a claim can appear even when no money was ever paid out.
Why the Report Costs You Money
Insurers use claims history to price risk, so an entry that is wrong is not a paperwork problem. It is a bill you keep paying every renewal.
A claim that was never paid. You called to ask whether something would be covered, decided not to file, and the conversation was logged as a claim anyway.
A claim that is not yours. Mixed files happen here for the same reason they happen at the credit bureaus: matching on partial identifiers. A similar name at a similar address is enough.
A claim attached to the wrong address. On a property report, a prior owner's loss can follow the house rather than the person who filed it.
An entry that should have aged off. C.L.U.E. carries up to seven years. Anything older than its reporting period should not be weighing on your quote.
Wrong amounts or wrong fault. A not-at-fault accident coded as at-fault changes the price materially.
Get Your Report Free
Section 1681j(a)(1)(C) entitles you to one free file disclosure every twelve months from each nationwide specialty consumer reporting agency, and LexisNexis operates as one. Section 1681g requires the agency to disclose all the information in your file and the sources of it.
Request the auto report and the property report separately, because they are separate files. If you are buying a house, ask the seller for the property C.L.U.E. report before you close, since the claims history attached to that address will follow it to you.
You are also entitled to a free copy after an adverse action. Section 1681m requires an insurer that raises your rate or declines you based on a consumer report to tell you so, identify the agency that supplied it, and inform you of your right to a free copy.
How to Dispute an Entry
Dispute in writing, by certified mail, return receipt requested, and keep the receipt and the green card. They establish the date the agency received the dispute, which is when the clock starts.
Name the specific claim: the date of loss, the claim number if there is one, and the carrier. State what is actually true. Attach the proof. A letter from the insurer confirming no payment was made. A police report establishing fault. A closing statement showing you did not own the property on the date of loss.
Dispute with the insurer that furnished the information as well. Section 1681s-2(b) requires that carrier to investigate once the dispute reaches it through the agency, and the carrier's own records are usually where the error can actually be fixed.
Ask for the Re-Rate
Correcting the report does not automatically refund what you overpaid.
Once the entry is removed, go back to the insurer that priced you on it and ask to be re-rated. Put that request in writing too, and attach the corrected report. Some carriers will adjust the current term, and some will go back further. Neither happens if nobody asks.
C.L.U.E. Is Not the Only LexisNexis File
LexisNexis Risk Solutions runs more than one product, and people often discover this halfway through a dispute.
C.L.U.E. is the claims history. Telematics OnDemand covers driving data from connected vehicles and apps, which is a newer and fast-growing category. Accurint is a separate investigative product used for locating people and verifying identity. LexisNexis also compiles public-record and motor vehicle data used in insurance underwriting.
These are different files. A dispute aimed at your C.L.U.E. report does not necessarily touch an error sitting in another LexisNexis product, so when you request a disclosure, ask what files the company holds on you rather than only asking for the one you already know about.
Before You Buy a House, Pull the Report
This is the single most useful thing in this article for anyone mid-purchase.
The property C.L.U.E. report follows the address. A water loss or a roof claim filed by the current owner stays attached to that house and will be read by your insurer when you go to bind a policy. People discover this at closing, when the quote comes back higher than they budgeted, and by then there is no time to dispute anything.
Ask the seller to pull the property report during the inspection period. Only the current owner can request it for their own address, which is why it has to be asked for rather than ordered. A house with two prior water claims is not necessarily a house to walk away from, but it is a house to price accurately, and a claim that was logged in error is far easier to challenge before you own it than after.
When the Agency Will Not Fix It
Section 1681e(b) requires a consumer reporting agency to follow reasonable procedures to assure maximum possible accuracy, and that duty applies to a specialty agency exactly as it applies to the big three.
An agency that attaches another person's claim to your file on a loose identifier match, is told so in a documented dispute, and confirms the entry anyway by checking its own record against the furnisher's record, has not conducted a reasonable reinvestigation.
Sections 1681n and 1681o provide for willful and negligent violations and shift attorney's fees to the defendant.
Common Questions
How long does a claim stay on a C.L.U.E. report?
The CFPB describes C.L.U.E. as reporting up to seven years of claims. Check the date of loss on each entry, because an item past its reporting period should not be affecting your quote.
Does asking about coverage count as a claim?
It should not, but inquiries do sometimes appear in the file, and some insurers treat them as signals. If a conversation where no claim was filed is logged as a claim, that is worth disputing.
Why does my new house have claims on it?
Because the property C.L.U.E. report follows the address as well as the owner. A loss filed by a previous owner can appear on a report pulled for your policy. Ask the seller for the report before closing.
Is C.L.U.E. the same as my credit report?
No. It is a specialty consumer report covering insurance claims history. It is separate from the credit-based insurance score some carriers also use, which draws on credit data instead.
Will a correction lower my premium automatically?
No. Ask the insurer to re-rate you in writing and attach the corrected report. Removing the entry and repricing the policy are two separate steps.
How do I get the report?
Can I sue over a C.L.U.E. error?
If the report was inaccurate, you disputed it, and it was not corrected, you may have a claim under section 1681e(b) or section 1681i against the agency, and under section 1681s-2(b) against the carrier that furnished the data. Attorney's fees shift to the defendant, so these are handled on contingency.
Start With the Letter
The dispute letter is what fixes the date and the record. Our free dispute letter generator writes one for you in plain English, formatted for certified mail, at no cost and with no account required.
If you have already disputed a C.L.U.E. entry and the agency verified it anyway, ask an FCRA lawyer to read the file with you.