Imagine discovering that someone else in the world shares not just your name, but your exact birthday, place of birth, and somehow, your Social Security number. Now imagine that fixing this bureaucratic impossibility actually makes your life worse. That's the reality one Reddit user has been living since 2018, and his story is a masterclass in how identity systems can fail spectacularly.

The Fix That Broke Everything

In a recent post on Reddit's r/personalfinance forum, the user explained that after the Social Security Administration issued him a new SSN to resolve the duplicate situation, his financial life didn't just stumble—it completely collapsed.

"Ever since I was issued the new number, I have not been able to get any loans," he wrote. Every credit check either failed outright or returned nothing. No credit score. No history. "Nothing has been reported to my credit report."

He figured time would sort it out. It didn't. Years later, two of the three major credit bureaus still had virtually nothing on file. TransUnion showed zero information. Equifax had a single account. Only Experian displayed some of his credit lines, but even that report was missing crucial accounts like old car payments, utilities, and rent history.

The inability to access credit is devastating enough, but the chaos extended far beyond finances. Because the other person continued using the original SSN, he found himself repeatedly mistaken for someone he'd never met. He received legal documents demanding payment for child support on a child that wasn't his. He nearly had to appear in court in North Carolina just to prove his innocence.

Then law enforcement got involved, and things went from bad to nightmarish.

"I was also arrested by the [Department of Motor Vehicles] police for DMV fraud and they suspended my license because [they] thought that I was committing fraud," he said. "But they just did not have my new Social Security number."

When Credit Bureaus Don't Talk to Each Other

So what went wrong? According to commenters on the thread, the problem lies in how credit bureaus handle new Social Security numbers. When the SSA issues a new number, credit bureaus don't automatically connect your old credit file to your new identity. They just don't.

"They wait for you and your creditors to update them," one top commenter explained. That means his accounts never linked to his new SSN, and when new creditors tried to verify him, they found nothing.

The solution, according to experts, involves mailing all three bureaus a comprehensive packet that includes the old SSN, new SSN, a letter from the Social Security Administration explaining the change, government-issued ID, and proof of address. This documentation is supposed to trigger a manual file merge.

The poster said he'd already asked his creditors to update his information and was told they were reporting correctly. But if the bureaus never merged the files, none of that mattered. The data was floating in limbo, attached to an identity that technically no longer existed.

Living With Someone Else's Criminal Record

To add insult to injury, he said he tracked down the man who shared his old SSN and discovered the "dude is a real piece of sh*t." During a car accident, police informed his girlfriend's parents that he had a criminal record—except those charges belonged to the other man. "Basically, when a cop pulls behind me, runs my plates and my name pops up, it shows all the bad sh*t the other guy did."

Stories like this underscore why having qualified financial guidance matters. Complex issues involving credit, taxes, and identity require more than Google searches and good intentions. Professional financial planners can help navigate bureaucratic nightmares before they spiral out of control, though even the best planning can't prevent every disaster.

For this Reddit user, the emotional and practical toll has been crushing. He's currently the sole income earner while caring for a partner battling stage 4 cancer.

"Not only is this affecting my life financially," he wrote, "it is also affecting the time and effort I have to prove that I'm not this other person."

It's a sobering reminder that in the modern financial system, your identity isn't just who you are. It's a collection of numbers and records scattered across databases that don't always communicate with each other. And when those systems break down, the burden of fixing them falls entirely on you.