This, the firm said in a statement, will allow people to get credit where previously they were rejected or negotiate lower interest rates.

MyCRA CEO Graham Doessel said that mortgage brokers have been frustrated for years, as clients had their bank funding cut off or rejected “because of trivial and vexatious civil court actions that judged them guilty until proven innocent” when it came to creditworthiness, regardless of the type matter before the court.

“We started campaigning to the Price Waterhouse Coopers’ three-year review of the Credit Reporting Code in 2017 to have this detrimental and harmful misreading of rules changed,” he said.

“Now only judgments can be recorded on someone’s credit file and those judgments must relate to ‘credit’ to impact someone’s credit rating. I recommend, on 15 February, everyone check their credit file, and if you see your civil court listing has been removed, then contact your bank and ask for an interest rate cut.”

It will also, Mr Doessel continued, “spell the end of weaponised civil court actions”.

“Tens of thousands of Australians have had their credit rating destroyed, businesses and financial security put in jeopardy all because civil court actions treated defendants as guilty till proven innocent when it came to their credit rating as ex-business partners, disgruntled employees and jilted lovers used civil courts as a weapon to cripple someone’s credit,” he said.

“We’ve had a client with a business employing 120 staff almost sent to the wall because of a trivial dispute with their pool repairman over $3,000 that never even went to court. Other common weaponised civil disputes are ex-business partners suing simply to dry up funding even spurned partners who are out to get their ex-lover’s business.”

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However, the firm noted, credit reporting bodies traditionally report this information and “still want to where they can get away with it”.

“Credit reporting bodies will be reading this legislation as narrowly as possible,” the firm said.

“In our discussions with one body they are already interpreting the changes differently to us and believe this change only applies to consumer files not commercial files which means for those with the most to lose, namely small business proprietors, are potentially in the same predicament,” Mr Doessel said.

“If this is the case and we won’t know till after 14 February when the changes come into effect, then it renders the new laws almost useless because those most affected by these will be small businesspeople.

“Anything on someone’s commercial credit file will show up on their individual report and while it is illegal to judge a consumer’s creditworthiness based on their commercial credit information it happens every day. We have a room full of client files that have been impacted by this very issue.

“The whole point of this legislative change was to remove guilty till proven innocent when it came to your creditworthiness, but if credit reporting bodies only apply this selectively then what is the point.”

MyCRA believes, it proclaimed, that the law changes need to apply to consumer and commercial credit files.

Even then the credit reporting system still isn’t perfect with people able to besmirch someone’s credit file simply by making credit enquiries in that person’s name via the internet with a just few personal details, but we are now headed in the right direction, Mr Doessel mused.

“The logic applies to both, simply commencing proceedings proves nothing, and this legal change needs to apply across all credit files,” he said.