The Mechanics of Eligibility Checking.

reliquit

Most eligibility checkers give you an answer (yes/no/maybe) within about 30 seconds, which I suspect is one of the reasons why people tend to think that their credit score is being used - after all, what would be better for a computer to base a decision on than a straight-forward numeric value? However, knowing now that the credit score has no real value, leaves me wondering what DO they receive on which a likely decision can be based?

D3xt3r5L4b

They do a soft search.
Look up what is looked at on a soft search Vs a hard search. 

reliquit

Yes I get that it's a soft search, and I apologise if my original query was not clear. But a lifetime of working with computer systems has taught me that computers are brilliant at evaluating numerics but less good at evaluating text. I would expect some sort of numeric test along the lines of:

If {response} > 500

    then

        print "Yes"

    else if {response} > 350

    then

        print "Maybe"

    else

        print "No"

which is why it is so tempting to think that your Credit Score is more important that it actually is, because a numeric score within known parameters would readily lend itself to this kind of evaluation. But if (as we are told here) that the credit score is not being used, then what else is available that can be instantly evaluated by a computer? Just curious.

[Deleted User]

back in the day when it gave you a percentage of being accepted before you 'officially' applied, you could look at the source code by pressing f12. I remember the 3 categories being 'accept', decline' and 'defer'. Was useful because you knew whether you'd be accepted or not, and could ignore the 'likelihood' of acceptance.

Malkytheheed

reliquit said:

Yes I get that it's a soft search, and I apologise if my original query was not clear. But a lifetime of working with computer systems has taught me that computers are brilliant at evaluating numerics but less good at evaluating text. I would expect some sort of numeric test along the lines of:

If {response} > 500

    then

        print "Yes"

    else if {response} > 350

    then

        print "Maybe"

    else

        print "No"

which is why it is so tempting to think that your Credit Score is more important that it actually is, because a numeric score within known parameters would readily lend itself to this kind of evaluation. But if (as we are told here) that the credit score is not being used, then what else is available that can be instantly evaluated by a computer? Just curious.

Of course they use a credit score, but it's their score, and it will (probably) be made up with criteria such as this. 
But it is not the score that the credit reference agencies give you. As that is only their score. Each lender will score differently. So the credit score that Experian give you is their formula. Whereas "barclaycard" might use significantly different critera. 

dr_adidas01

Malkytheheed said:

reliquit said:

Yes I get that it's a soft search, and I apologise if my original query was not clear. But a lifetime of working with computer systems has taught me that computers are brilliant at evaluating numerics but less good at evaluating text. I would expect some sort of numeric test along the lines of:

If {response} > 500

    then

        print "Yes"

    else if {response} > 350

    then

        print "Maybe"

    else

        print "No"

which is why it is so tempting to think that your Credit Score is more important that it actually is, because a numeric score within known parameters would readily lend itself to this kind of evaluation. But if (as we are told here) that the credit score is not being used, then what else is available that can be instantly evaluated by a computer? Just curious.

Of course they use a credit score, but it's their score, and it will (probably) be made up with criteria such as this. 
But it is not the score that the credit reference agencies give you. As that is only their score. Each lender will score differently. So the credit score that Experian give you is their formula. Whereas "barclaycard" might use significantly different critera. 

This is useless as the U.K. doesn’t use the FICO score system, it’s only used in America. In America they do take into consideration the scores CRA’s give you. 

Here each lender has there own unique scoring method, which a part of is data from the CRA’s the rest is down to whether you fit the type of customer they are looking for and if you will make them money. 

Barclaycard don’t use Experian for there credit search they use Equifax. They do however report account conduct to Experian/Equifax/Trans-Union.