I refer to letter Urgent need to regulate credit checkers and would like to share my personal experience of being blacklisted by Ctos (or shall I use the term 'listed'?). I took a car loan from Public Finance in 1992 but ran into problem when I sold the car and gave the buyer some time to settle the loan while allowing him continue to service the loan under my name (a mistake I now regret obviously).

Unfortunately, he went into hiding for a while and I ran into problem with my loan. However, the loan was fully settled on Oct 28, 1994. I thought everything was settled but little did I realise that my name was already included in Ctos' database.

I got a rude shock in 2002 when I applied for another car loan and was told that my name was 'blacklisted' by Ctos and burden was on me to prove that I have already settled the loan. I got back to Public Finance and I was issued a letter stating that the loan was settled. I got my loan.

But when I tried to apply for another loan from Bank Rakyat, a similar problem surfaced and when I contacted Public Finance (now I know that I should have settled the issue with Ctos and not Public Finance), I was asked to prove that I was indeed blacklisted as I claimed in my two letters I wrote to them.

Since then, there were many occasions where my loan and credit card applications were rejected due to unspecified reasons, which I think may be due to Ctos' blacklist. Finally, I decided to visit Ctos personally this year. They were very sympathetic and took all the settlement letters from me and promised to add the words 'Loan has been settled' in the database.

However, my name will still remain in the database and it is their company policy not to delete it.

I believe that everyone who takes a loan or any other financial facility must honour their responsibilities. Having said that, I believe Ctos get their information form court cases, tip-offs and many other 'creative sources'. My question is why can't Ctos show similar enthusiasm and creativity in recognising the fact that my case was settled almost 13 years ago and that my name need to be 'de-listed'?

It is worse when we, the unfortunate ones to be included in their database without our knowledge, suffer without any clues. Now I know why my wife, who gets a lower income than myself, is treated more favourably by the banks.

My message to Ctos - update your database to reflect the latest status of all the people there. I am sure Ctos will survive its present problems as their service may be still vital for financial institutions (even though many denials have been made) but the government must ensure that the rights of the 'rakyat' rights are taken care as well.