Credit history issues for older married women

RMERJ

We are of the older generation.  All accounts have been in joint name, banks, mortgage and so on. Some like credit cards and utilities only allowed one name.  In our case mine.  We have recently come across relatives whose circumstances have changed (not financially) but have wanted to get a credit card in their own name, rather than as a second card holder. Despite reasonable income (way over most published minimum needed), freehold property owner and reasonable savings and a good Experian score, are finding it hard to get approval based on websites such as MSE that offers a free checking service,  I sense it is an ageist/sexist issue that the algorithms can't handle.  Of course no human intelligence is allowed to  apply common sense in such matters.
Have other people had similar experiences?  Is it something that people, particularly older, should be made aware of so they can make any appropriate changes?
We were able to get a card but not from our top choice companies.

Ebe_Scrooge

It's not agist, it's not sexist, your Experian score means nothing, savings are not factored into lending decisions.  It'll be down purely to (from the sounds of it) a thin credit file.  Look at the credit-builder cards at as first port of call - when you've got a bit of history under your belt, you should find that more main-stream lenders will become available.

[Deleted User]

It's not age or sex, but risk. High risk isn't exclusive to older women.

Neither your Experian score or savings factor into lending, but how you've managed credit in the past.  With that sort of history, you'll need to start with a higher risk lender. But you can improve that over time. 

MattMattMattUK

RMERJ said:

We are of the older generation.  All accounts have been in joint name, banks, mortgage and so on. Some like credit cards and utilities only allowed one name.  In our case mine.  We have recently come across relatives whose circumstances have changed (not financially) but have wanted to get a credit card in their own name, rather than as a second card holder. 

That is fair enough, but someone with no previous credit history is starting from scratch.

RMERJ said:

Despite reasonable income (way over most published minimum needed), freehold property owner and reasonable savings and a good Experian score, are finding it hard to get approval based on websites such as MSE that offers a free checking service, 

Lending criteria are based on risk, a huge part of risk calculation is credit history, if you have zero credit history it is very difficult to borrow or obtain large amounts of credit. The best would be something like Capital One, they have a pre-approval checker on their site. Also being a property owner will not impact unsecured credit, the lenders have no ability to verify that and being unsecured it is largely irrelevant anyway. 

RMERJ said:

I sense it is an ageist/sexist issue that the algorithms can't handle.  

It is not an ageist or sexist issue, it is an issue that anyone with no credit record is going to have.

RMERJ said:

Of course no human intelligence is allowed to  apply common sense in such matters.

Human intervention will not be allowed due to the fact that nearly everyone declined would ask for a human review, with massive workload implications. The second issue is "common sense" does not really mean much, especially when applying for credit, it is based on risk, someone without a borrowing history is a risk, hence most mainstream products not being available to them, but many products designed for those with low and or no credit scores available to them.

RMERJ said:

Have other people had similar experiences?  Is it something that people, particularly older, should be made aware of so they can make any appropriate changes?

Other people will have yes, there have been some of them on here. It is not really something that older people need to be specifically made aware of, it is a fairly standard situation for anyone without a credit record (or with a blank one). 

RMERJ said:

We were able to get a card but not from our top choice companies.

So no real issue then. I mean personally I would love a card from Coutts and Arbuthnot's but I don't meet their criteria, so I have to stick with Amex, MBNA and Nationwide.

Sandtree

RMERJ said:

Have other people had similar experiences?  Is it something that people, particularly older, should be made aware of so they can make any appropriate changes?
We were able to get a card but not from our top choice companies.

Its mainly an issue of lack of history which has nothing directly due to age or gender... the young can suffer the same problem because of lack of history. The "gender" issue is more linked to the outdated view that man works, woman keeps home thats resulted in this not that the bank is penalising someone for being a woman.

Only the 0.0000000001% may have free choice of whatever card they want... the rest of us have to be credit risk assessed and may or may not get the cards we want depending on our life and financial decisions. Personally I'd love the Sberbank gold infinity card thats actually gold because its made of gold rather than gold coloured plastic... I'm sure its the lack of the Russian address thats stopping me rather than the $100,000 the card costs ($65,000 covers the gold, diamonds and craftmanship in actually making the card)

SiliconChip

RMERJ said:

...utilities only allowed one name.  In our case mine. 

The simple answer to this for a couple is to have some utilities in one name and some in the other. The fact that you didn't do this doesn't mean that the checking algorithms are either ageist or sexist.

Chris_English

RMERJ said:

We are of the older generation.  All accounts have been in joint name, banks, mortgage and so on. Some like credit cards and utilities only allowed one name.  In our case mine.  We have recently come across relatives whose circumstances have changed (not financially) but have wanted to get a credit card in their own name, rather than as a second card holder. Despite reasonable income (way over most published minimum needed), freehold property owner and reasonable savings and a good Experian score, are finding it hard to get approval based on websites such as MSE that offers a free checking service,  I sense it is an ageist/sexist issue that the algorithms can't handle.  Of course no human intelligence is allowed to  apply common sense in such matters.
Have other people had similar experiences?  Is it something that people, particularly older, should be made aware of so they can make any appropriate changes?
We were able to get a card but not from our top choice companies.

There's nothing in what you have written suggesting ageism or sexism; so it's not clear where you are getting that idea from.

theoretica

It's not direct ageism or sexism, but it will be something with a tendency to affect people who have organised their household finances in a particular way that seems to be most prevalent with older generations. Algorithms which are looking for one thing but end up duplicating or continuing the inequalities of the past are a known problem. 

Marchitiello

The OP mentioned that they may have had mortgage and ai guess the shared account may have had an overdraft facility. Hopefully some of this still show on the Credit File? Maybe the electoral roll ?  I would always recommend in the first instance a credit card offered by the Bank one has been banking with as first point of call. They would have built an internal customer profile and the Credit Check carried out by them will often focus mostly on checking what other debts the person may have, if known by other names and any other financial association. If all it is clean and they have a good history with the Bank, I bet is more likely they can get a card from them rather then a subprime card. 

Jami74

RMERJ said:

 Is it something that people, particularly older, should be made aware of so they can make any appropriate changes?

Yes! Make them aware and tell them to educate their children/grandchildren about financial independence so they don't follow the same path and end up with no credit history to their name.