Rejected for Halifax One card... but no credit search?!

rachaellyndsey

Has anyone heard of this?

On Saturday, my husband applied for the Halifax One Card. Me and my husband have perfect credit, and have our mortgage with Halifax. We have previous credit history that we've paid off. We were preapproved for the card by Halifax, and he applied online.

After applying online, we got a rejection message after a minute or so of processing. Confused, we rang Halifax, who told us we were both perfect candidates, and that we should ring Experian who they check with.

We both have experian accounts, (Scores of 980 and 971), and when we rang them they said there was no reason why we'd be rejected based on the report, it must have been Halifax.

Anyway, both say that the other rejected us.. but what REALLY confuses me, is that Experian have said that Halifax never credit checked us. They said it comes through immediately on their system, and there's nothing at all.




Is it normal for Halifax not to do a credit search when rejecting someone for credit? As a side note, we consequently applied for a capital one platinum after this rejection (not ideal I know), but this capital one credit search shows in both my husbands experian report, and my own (as a linked person), so there definitately isn't a problem with the experian account.



Does anyone have any suggestions or experience with rejection for this account with perfect credit? Or rejection for credit without a credit check?

[Deleted User]

You may have failed internal credit policies, which meant it didn't go to credit search.

On another note - although the Experian scores are largely meaningless, you may want to look at your reports more closely as your scores are lower than the generic 999 that most people receive unless they have had issues in the past.

sfax

Get an up to date credit report from Experian and confirm that there is no search (they appear almost instantaneously). If there is definitely no search, notify Halifax as they may have searched the wrong person. I assume no change of address recently. Ignore your Experian score and don't waste any more money on getting it.

The only other thing may be salary and the amount of outstanding debt but I think that would only be considered in conjunction with your credit report. They could decide that based on your salary and mortgage repayments that they can't offer you a card (without even referring to your credit report)

rachaellyndsey

I checked with Experian, I looked at both of our reports over the weekend, and rang them this morning to confirm that absolutely no credit check has been done by Halifax on either of our accounts.

We've not moved recently.. we're both 24, with 50k left on our mortgage & annual income of that amount also- which is significantly higher than when Halifax gave us the mortgage.

I know that there's a person with the same name and DOB as my husband in Wales, because around 2 years ago we had a default on our account because of his non-payment of a phone bill. The default was removed immediately (and experian confirm there is no trace of it), and we were awarded compensation by the debt collection company. We mentioned this to Experian when we rang to check our account, and the guy said there was no record of this at all on our report. I can't see any mention at all of it either, & it was 2 years ago. I assume that it's just a coincidence, but that is the only negative thing I can think of.

Is it heard of to be rejected by internal policies (even though you're pre-approved & Halifax told us we were perfect candidates), without any credit check? It feels bizarre

rachaellyndsey

So.. I just rang Halifax and explained I was worried that they could have credit checked the wrong person, so I wanted to confirm who they'd checked. They just told me that they use 4 different credit check agencies.. they couldn't go into my account so couldn't tell me which they'd used.

All the people I spoke to on Saturday (4) said that they use Experian, and when I submitted the application, it said specifically that they'd check with Experian

Surely they have to tell you who they're checking your credit with? And they have a responsibility to take concerns that they've checked the wrong persons credit seriously?

lifebeginstoday

Might be worth checking your report with Equifax and Noodle (Call Credit) both do free trials and see what info is on them.

If the default has been wiped with Experian it could still be on one of the others??

Not sure who the forth CRA is, but as said in a previous reply whats your current salary to debt ratio could well have been declined on internal scoring.

YorkshireBoy

lifebeginstoday wrote: »

Not sure who the forth CRA is

It's possibly not a CRA, but a FPA (fraud prevention agency) such as NHunter?

Halifax generally, in my experience of being offered, and granted, many pre-approved offers over recent years, say that it's "based on what we already know about you".

Now they already know about your financial dealings with them (current account, mortgage, spending patterns, etc), and they already take a monthly feed from the CRAs (google CII [consumer indebtedness index]) so know about your debt etc elsewhere.

Therefore my money's on something thrown up by the FPA search (maybe linked to the other issue you raised?).

I think you can SAR (subject access request) NHunter for a £10 fee, but in your case I'd be raising a formal complaint with Halifax. The lending code says they must tell you the primary reason for rejecting you. They can't say it was based on data obtained from Experian because a) they didn't search you, and b) they'd already obtained the monthly feed very recently*, so you'll force their hand somewhat.


* Unless something has been placed on your CRA file since their last monthly feed was received?

rachaellyndsey

We have a mortgage which has 50k left, a 1.5k loan from my husbands company, & a £700 credit for sofa. Income is 50k. We want the card just to pay for some flights to Japan (1.5k) so we can pay it off interest free over the 15 months, rather than have a big chunk go out of our account.

We've had other credit accounts in the past (eg. engagement ring etc) but they've all been paid off.

Ill do the equifax & noodle search now to see if they bring anything up, thanks


I've arranged a branch appointment with Halifax on Saturday, at least if we speak to a human, and we have an appointment so they can't just put us through to a pre-recorded message about why they may reject some people, we might make a bit of progress

Thanks for everyones help so far- it's really appreciated

YorkshireBoy

rachaellyndsey wrote: »

I've arranged a branch appointment with Halifax on Saturday, at least if we speak to a human, and we have an appointment so they can't just put us through to a pre-recorded message about why they may reject some people, we might make a bit of progress

Don't hold your breath!

I think all you'll get on Saturday is the free use of their phone...to call and listen to "a pre-recorded message about why they may reject some people"...because the people that can answer your query, ie the underwriters, won't work Saturdays.

If you raise a formal complaint, as I've already suggested, then at least your issue will get to somebody who can actually resolve it.

rachaellyndsey

haha, we'll be raising a formal complaint if that's the response

rachaellyndsey

There isn't anything different on the equifax report- no mention of the individual with my husbands name/DOB and again there isn't any record of a search by Halifax (the capital one search on the same day is there)