30
Opinion of the Court
and is denied credit as a result of the agency's wrongdoing. At that point, the Government asserts, "the consumer would presumably be put on inquiry notice of the violation, and the discovery rule would start the running of the normal limitation period." Brief for United States et al. as Amici Curiae 22 (emphasis deleted); see Tr. of Oral Arg. 35-36 (argument in accord by Andrews' counsel). Some days or months later, the consumer follows up on her suspicions by requesting a copy of her credit report, to which the agency responds by concealing the initial improper disclosure. According to Andrews and the Government, the misrepresentation exception would then operate to toll the already-commenced limitations period until the agency reveals its wrongdoing.
We reject this argument for several reasons. As an initial matter, we are not persuaded by this effort to distinguish the practical function of a discovery rule and the express exception, because we doubt that the supporting scenario is likely to occur outside the realm of theory. The fatal weakness in the narrative is its assumption that a consumer would be charged with constructive notice of an improper disclosure upon denial of a credit application. If the consumer habitually paid her bills on time, the denial might well lead her to suspect a prior credit agency error. But the credit denial would place her on "inquiry notice," and the discovery rule would trigger the limitations period at that point, only if a reasonable person in her position would have learned of the injury in the exercise of due diligence. See Stone v. Williams, 970 F. 2d 1043, 1049 (CA2 1992) ("The duty of inquiry having arisen, plaintiff is charged with whatever knowledge an inquiry would have revealed."); 2 C. Corman, Limitation of Actions § 11.1.6, p. 164 (1991) ("It is obviously unreasonable to charge the plaintiff with failure to search for the missing element of the cause of action if such element would not have been revealed by such search.").
In the usual circumstance, the plaintiff will gain knowledge of her injury from the credit reporting agency. The
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