Capital One - how do they know about my finances?

rach_k

Apologies if this has been asked before or if this is the wrong board.

Today my husband and I both received letters inviting us to apply for a Capital One classic credit card. His letter was very different to mine - it said how the card is their most popular, lots of great features blah blah blah. Mine, on the other hand, started with 'we understand how hard it can be to improve your finances' and went on to say that the card could help me build my credit.

OH works and pays all the bills from his account; I'm a stay at home mum who does a little freelancing for some 'fun money' so I don't have much of a credit history. That explains the difference but how does Capital One know about our finances? It isn't the first letter I've had like this either, I think MBNA have sent me a few similar but I've never had the direct comparison with OH before! I don't think I've ever even applied for a credit card... or perhaps once about 10 years ago from HSBC. Where do they get the info from? We have a joint account with the Co-op and we've both had accounts with Barclays but I don't think there are any other similarities with our finances.

adindas

I think the wording is different because you have been offered a different type of Credit Card.

In your case it is probably credit building credit card. FYI, I have been offered credit Building credit cards a few time, yet I have ten credit cards and only use them to take advantage of them such as cashback foreign purchase, one month grace period, etc ...

Look at the wording, if it said you are INVITED TO APPLY it will mean that this is just a blanket fishing and once you apply they will start looking your credit record to make the decision. They get online infos from websites/ merchants you have visited, from marketing companies or your marketing profiles from other companies you have dealt with.

Few credit card will clearly say “guarantee approved” but it will normally start with very small limit e.g. less than £500.

rach_k wrote: »

Apologies if this has been asked before or if this is the wrong board.

Today my husband and I both received letters inviting us to apply for a Capital One classic credit card. His letter was very different to mine - it said how the card is their most popular, lots of great features blah blah blah. Mine, on the other hand, started with 'we understand how hard it can be to improve your finances' and went on to say that the card could help me build my credit.

OH works and pays all the bills from his account; I'm a stay at home mum who does a little freelancing for some 'fun money' so I don't have much of a credit history. That explains the difference but how does Capital One know about our finances? It isn't the first letter I've had like this either, I think MBNA have sent me a few similar but I've never had the direct comparison with OH before! I don't think I've ever even applied for a credit card... or perhaps once about 10 years ago from HSBC. Where do they get the info from? We have a joint account with the Co-op and we've both had accounts with Barclays but I don't think there are any other similarities with our finances.

shortcrust

They don't really know about your finances as such. Capital One will simply get lists of names that fit certain profiles from marketing companies who use the info they have to 'guess' stuff like that. Every time you forget to click the 'don't share my info' box you're adding more detail to the picture they have of you. Think of all the details they can get if you forget to click on the 'don't share my details' box on an insurance quote site.

rach_k

Thanks!

We were both invited to apply for the same 'classic' credit card - same interest rate, same credit limit but my letter is very much targeting people who have a poor credit history, both in the way it's written and the 'features' of the card it points out.

I think it probably does come from insurance quotes - that kind of site is probably the only place where we'd enter any information like job titles and they could guess income from there.

Thanks to you both. I can stop wondering how they know about me now!

Nuttydj

it may just be a test.... companies like to see which one works best, admittedly sending one to each of you is a bad idea anyway but still