“A consumer reporting agency shall make all disclosures pursuant to section 609 and furnish all consumer reports pursuant to section 611(d) without charge to the consumer if, within thirty days after receipt by such consumer of a notification pursuant to section 615 or notification from a debt collection agency affiliated with such consumer reporting agency stating that the consumer's credit rating may be or has been adversely affected, the consumer makes a request under section 609 or 611(d). Otherwise, the consumer reporting agency may impose a reasonable charge on the consumer for making disclosure to such consumer pursuant to section 609, the charge for which shall be indicated to the consumer prior to making disclosure; and for furnishing notifications, statements, summaries, or codifications to persons designated by the consumer pursuant to section 611(d), the charge for which shall be indicated to the consumer prior to furnishing such information and shall not exceed the charge that the consumer reporting agency would impose on each designated recipient for a consumer report except that no charge may be made for notifying such persons of the deletion of information which is found to be inaccurate or which can no longer be verified.”

1. Irrelevance of Subsequent Grant of Credit or Reason for Denial

A consumer denied credit because of a consumer report from a consumer reporting agency has the right to a free disclosure from that agency within 30 days of receipt of the section 615(a) notice, even if credit was subsequently granted or the basis of the denial was that the references supplied by the consumer are too few or too new to appear in the credit file.

2. Charge for Reinvestigation Prohibited

This section does not permit consumer reporting agencies to charge for making the reinvestigation or following other procedures required by section 611 (a)–(c).

3. Permissible Charges for Services Requested by Consumers

A consumer reporting agency may charge fees for creating files on consumers at their request, or for other services not required by the FCRA that are requested by consumers.