Campaign to Force Companies to disclose reason for refusing credit

nicecarkeys

Gonzo1966

Could I pm you with a couple of questions? I have a friend that the exact same thing happened to with capital bank. Her info has been removed from the CRA's also but she is seeing a solicitor as the default they lodged resulted in her having to take a high rate mortgage with a huge Early Repayment Charge to leave.
Data Protection Act gives you the right to take the company keeping your information incorrectly that results in you being penalised in any form.

helen313

Actually, I doubt you'd get anywhere with it.

chani1

the reason most lenders don't disclose information on declines is mainly due to fraud prevention for example the loan reason it can decline for buisness use, tax bills and so on but the main reasons are either your credit score doesn't match there lending criteria or your affordability(if you are asked about existing debts eg credit cards and they ask you how much tou pay on them always state the min pymt even if you pay more coz that believe it or not goes against your affordability) also time at add and job (3yrs at each is great but anything over a year is ok) also if the time at your add doesnt match your er time. Even assosiate adverse can affect the outcome these are judt some possability as to why you were declined even if you have a good credit score.

Johnss24

Lenders should definitely divulge reason. See my Alliance and Leicester Loan experience. They advertise at low rates then bump them up saying you don't merit low rate. It's a con. I proved them wrong.

Pontoon

I definately think you should be told.
I have just moved flat and job (doubled my salary when I moved job).
I was refused for a contract mobile phone, which I was very embarrassed about, but after checking with equifax I discovered that there was no problem with my report so I went back to Tmobile and asked why and if I could get the phone if all was well.
They returned telling me it wasnt my credit report, but my address which was the problem, and after several phonecalls and a very patient person in one of their shops we finally got computer to say yes! I got my vario II yesterday.

... Now i'm trying to get a loan to buy a car and I'm finding it increasingly infuriating as again I'm getting refused which is really beginning to get to me.
Hoping it is still my address causing the problem, but I'll probably never know.

I think its ironic that i'm more financially stable now than ever, but I get refused a £4000 loan to buy a car from a bank which i'm already a customer with.

Will.Power_2

When it comes to declining people, sometimes there are straight-forward reasons (you've got a very bad credit history. Other times it may be a combination of many factors, so it's not always easy to give a precise answer.
Lenders (particularly the credit card guys) are getting very sophisticated in their scoring methods, having a number of different scorecards that look at your propensity (likelihood), possible fraud, potential facility usage, and profitability.
This means that you may have a great credit rating but as you're not a regular balance holder there's no profit to be made by giving you a credit cared.
The thing with scorecards is that they measure a combination of factors to create the score and no single item will cause you to fail. (Lender have policy rules to filter out those who fail specific criteria, eg. age.) You may have a couple of late payments, but other factors (including interest and charges) may cause the lender to accept you (probably at a higher interest rate for the extra risk).
The score only indicates how many people at that score are likely to be acceptable in terms of risk and profitability; if too many aren't acceptable, the lender is better off declining everyone at that score.
Final point with credit bureau information is that lenders are not allowed to disclose the lending history information they see, to you. The data is 'owned' by the other lenders and can only be provided to you by the credit bureau. The lender to whom you've applied isn't even supposed to tell you that you've been declined because of bad credit, as this discloses information they've seen in the credit search.
While I agree that you should always be given a reason, it can be difficult to be precise.

Will.Power_2

Pontoon, unfortunately flats often cause the credit bureaux problems, particularly in some Scottish towns and London 'mansion blocks'. Their sytems can't work out the flat number, block number, house name, etc into a sensible order.
Get in touch with them to identify what they hold about the varying possible combinations of your address, then get them to correct all the errors into your true address.

Pontoon

Will.Power wrote:

Pontoon, unfortunately flats often cause the credit bureaux problems, particularly in some Scottish towns and London 'mansion blocks'. Their sytems can't work out the flat number, block number, house name, etc into a sensible order.
Get in touch with them to identify what they hold about the varying possible combinations of your address, then get them to correct all the errors into your true address.

Thanks.
I've found that Alliance and Leicester are particularly obstructive so I've cancelled my query and I'm taking my business elsewhere.

You can apply for stuff on line and on the phone, however to complain or make enquiries about loan refusals you have to use snail mail (though I managed to find and email address for the underwriters dept) and wait. I need the loan fairly quickly, and I expressed the reason why to the person I spoke to on the phone, but she seemed happier about me cancelling my application than possibly trying to speak to their underwriting department who could take up to a fortnight to reply to my email.
Poor customer service mean failed customer service. If they can't look after a customer they can't look after my money!!!

I have been investigating the problem with my address. Turns out I'm not on the electoral register there yet (just faxed the form through to them so that should be sorted) and also the flat doesn't exist in the database so I've to speak to someone at the council to sort this out. Every other flat in the block is available while I'm just 46 x street, while everyone else has G1 or G2 or 1/1 or 1/2. 2/2 doesnt exist :-(

A_little_stressed!!

I applied for a basic credit card with Capital One, they sent a letter declining me, I rang them to see why and go through my details, I actually earnt more than my online application (from places other than my main work, there wasn't an option to fill this in online. WTC etc) but she said I still didn't earn enough. I asked how much I had to earn & she said she couldn't tell me!!WHY??!! Thats just an excuse. It doesn't make sense, because I could have re-applied at a later date after a pay rise or increasing my hours etc. But I can't keep reapplying because it would effect my rating score!

Its utter madness! And thats coming from someone who is a bit cookoo herself!

I VOTED YES!

mhadit

unfortunatly credit companies are under no obligation to tell why you were refused. It should, however, be fairly easy to tell why you were denied. How much "disposable" income do you have. How long have you been at your current job (ie how secure is your employment)? How is your past credit?
Put all the peices together and you'd probably get they're reasons.

There are ways, though, to improve your situation in such ways that you are a better candidate.

Sincerely,
M. Hadit.

http://controlmydebt.blogspot.com