Maiden Name Married Name

stu2500

Hi all. My wife has recently remortgaged her BTL to a new lender, no additional borrowing, just to reduce the rate and she put it in her married name. All of her other accounts, including our joint mortgage, are still in her maiden name. 

She has recently tried to do a new balance transfer card in her married name but has been declined. Which is unusual as she has a very strong credit history of no missed payments or adverse. Could the name differences across accounts be causing issues with securing new credit? 

Her credit file will show as having a mortgage in each of her surnames.

etienneg

Your post is a bit vague and so difficult to understand clearly.

"She has recently tried to do a new balance transfer card in her married name but has been declined."
What has she "tried to do"? Do you mean she has applied for a new card, or attempted to transfer a balance?

"Her credit file will show as having a mortgage in each of her surnames."
What do you mean by "will show"? Is this an assumption, or have you looked and found out what it actually shows?

If the former, don't make assumptions but actually look. And don't assume that everybody knows that the two names refer to the same person. It's quite possible that there are two credit files, one in each name. If that were so, she could have just the new mortagage on the married name one, so no significant history. If she has applied for a new balance transfer card in this name, a decline is therefore quite likely.

More generally, using two names is problematic. Consistency is very important, in finacial matters (including insurance) and government things (such as passport, driving licence and NHS). I've known women quite successfully use two names, such as retaining maiden name just for work-related matters and switching over to married name for everything else, but the key here is to be absolutely rigid and consistent about the division.

The simplest approach is to use one name for everything. If this is to be the married name, then the name needs to be changed on everything, once and for all. Leaving some things unchanged because you "didn't think they would matter" is likely to lead to problems at some point.

stu2500

etienneg said:

Your post is a bit vague and so difficult to understand clearly.

"She has recently tried to do a new balance transfer card in her married name but has been declined."
What has she "tried to do"? Do you mean she has applied for a new card, or attempted to transfer a balance?

"Her credit file will show as having a mortgage in each of her surnames."
What do you mean by "will show"? Is this an assumption, or have you looked and found out what it actually shows?

If the former, don't make assumptions but actually look. And don't assume that everybody knows that the two names refer to the same person. It's quite possible that there are two credit files, one in each name. If that were so, she could have just the new mortagage on the married name one, so no significant history. If she has applied for a new balance transfer card in this name, a decline is therefore quite likely.

More generally, using two names is problematic. Consistency is very important, in finacial matters (including insurance) and government things (such as passport, driving licence and NHS). I've known women quite successfully use two names, such as retaining maiden name just for work-related matters and switching over to married name for everything else, but the key here is to be absolutely rigid and consistent about the division.

The simplest approach is to use one name for everything. If this is to be the married name, then the name needs to be changed on everything, once and for all. Leaving some things unchanged because you "didn't think they would matter" is likely to lead to problems at some point.

Apologies.

Her new BTL mortgage is in her married name and our existing mortgage for the family home is in her maiden name.

She has jsut tried to open a new credit card to complete a balance transfer but applied in her married name. all of her other accounts on her credit history/file are in her maiden name, it is only the new BTL in married name. She was declined the new card and I think it is because she applied in her married name and not in maiden name (where most of her accounts are).