Fraud Alert when Applying for Credit

[ultrarunner]

I printed in large Font and Laminated above the phone in Mom's house the following...

"My Son takes care of this... leave your number"

Which 98% of the time is followed by a hang up.

When people call for donations Mom says this:

"I tithe through my church"

I've been at her home when solicitors call and she tells them to hang on and talk to her son... almost always they hang up...

Just a lot of scammers out there and with many off-shore their is little any individual can do if their mind is going...

Many of my friends simply do not answer the phone unless it is known... for people in their 80's and above this is still seen as impolite for the most part.

 

[Otto Syracuse]

I use my cell phone for business and it is not uncommon for me to get a business call from a number that is not in my contacts. So I do answer almost every call, unless it is from an area I am sure would have no reason for calling me.

My latest gripe is Marcia, from the warranty department....Sometimes three or four calls a day...Very irritating to say the least. I always block the nu her when I hear that, but I still get them all the time.

Also, Sirius Satellite calls frequently....From a local number. I never answer it, they can send me a letter if they want something.

 

[thepumpguysc]

Funny you should mention Sirius.. Got 8 from them last week. The new car free trial isn't even up yet, still have 2 months left..
I had to cancel the subscription from the old car.. wrecked.. and put it on hold.. then when the free trial runs out, the old contract will kick back in..
Try explaining THAT to the caller.. I told them to mail me the info.. and I hung up..

 

[ultrarunner]

Sirus...

One of my friends is very hard of hearing... zero on one side and 30% on the other.

The Radio people are relentless. It got to the point he told them he was going to file an ADA complaint against them for harassment... he can't hear except for loud noises like a car horn.

 

[hawkeye08]

It is hard teaching the older generation not to fall for these scams. I got a call from a ~90 year old retired financial planner, he was paying his bills when a popup came up on his computer screen. It looked official and instructed him to call 800 number immediately to fix his computer. He thought it was from his bank since that is what he was logged into at the time. He called me after the he got concerned that he let someone work on his computer remotely, they wanted $400 to finish the fix. I told him to turn off his computer and gave him a reputable computer guys number. I got the same popup a few weeks later, it really looked legit.

 

[ultrarunner]

This one has got a lot of my retired friends...

 

[BrokeFarmerJohn]

I use my cell phone for business and it is not uncommon for me to get a business call from a number that is not in my contacts. So I do answer almost every call, unless it is from an area I am sure would have no reason for calling me.

My latest gripe is Marcia, from the warranty department....Sometimes three or four calls a day...Very irritating to say the least. I always block the nu her when I hear that, but I still get them all the time.

Also, Sirius Satellite calls frequently....From a local number. I never answer it, they can send me a letter if they want something.

When I had a truck that had satellite radio, those people called all the time, most annoying company to do business with.

 

[ishiboo]

I just learned a very concerning source of fishing phone calls resulting from checks on your credit.

I started applying for a mortgage last week. 3 days after the phone calls started coming in from fishers proportioning to represent other mortgage companies to solicit a loan. The last one said they were from Experian (the credit bureau). In quizzing him he stated that Experian is also in the Mortgage business. When I asked to speak to his supervisor, at that point he hung up.

Some internet searching revealed that they are not even a US company. They are headquartered in Ireland (the home of a lot of scam deals). Also there is a lot negative reports on the internet about their business practices which indicates they are less than an honest business. They are the only credit bureau of the three that charges for a credit report and they scam a lot of people with their subscription service.

Beware is all I can say.

Ron

When someone pulls your credit, it goes to 1 or more credit bureaus to provide the info. Usually for a mortgage, all three. Experian sells the notification of that to mortgage companies so they can solicit your business when they know you're looking to purchase/refinance. It's not phishing, it's not a scam, it's just sales and marketing.

Mortgage Leads Generation | Refinance Leads | Buy Mortgage Internet Leads For Sale | Experian

Experian PLC is the parent company located in Ireland - it's a very large company with a lot of acquisitions over the years. Experian North America is the subsidy that does the credit reporting - it's located in the US. We use them for verifying e-mail addresses in our marketing efforts as they acquired that company. They're an honest business, but when you pay late and it's recorded to your credit report it tends to piss people off.

All three credit bureaus charge for credit reports and offer a paid subscription service, it's not a scam at all. Your FREE yearly credit report as required by the government is NOT required to include your score, up-to-date monitoring, etc. It IS required to be offered by all 3 bureaus, and of course Experian provides it for FREE as required. FICO scores are licensed by the 3 bureaus from Fair Isaac and they pay big bucks for it, so some services use a different scoring methodology like VantageScore, even though anyone looking at your credit for a loan/etc. is using a FICO score version. Your numerical score is irrelevant to the point of a free credit report - for you to ensure the information on your credit report is accurate - and so it's not provided.

Ireland is a first world country who actively investigates and prosecutes wire fraud. They're not the "home of a lot of scam deals", in fact there's far more in the US. Ireland has a 12.5% corporate tax rate, versus 35% in the US in a place like Indiana. They did 1.3 BILLION DOLLARS worth of PROFIT last year, so being located in Ireland generated $255 million dollars more profit for their shareholders than if they were located in the US, among other things.

You can opt out of receiving those offers, of course: https://www.optoutprescreen.com

Take off the tinfoil hat.

 

[ishiboo]

Sorry, I linked the wrong product of how they found out you were shopping... in the industry it's called a "trigger lead" and their information is here: Reach Customers Actively Shopping for Credit | Prospect Triggers | Experian US

 

[ultrarunner]

I put a roof on my home and charged it to the credit card to get a rebate as there was no difference.

My FICO plummeted and I paid the card in full when the statement came and never have used it again... the next month the FICO was back to where I started.

It did tick me off that simply using the card would have such a negative effect.

 

[scdeerslayer]

I put a roof on my home and charged it to the credit card to get a rebate as there was no difference.

My FICO plummeted and I paid the card in full when the statement came and never have used it again... the next month the FICO was back to where I started.

It did tick me off that simply using the card would have such a negative effect.

Most likely that was because of a very significant change to your used vs available credit ratio, especially if it was close to the card's limit and you don't have other revolving credit accounts.

 

[ishiboo]

Most likely that was because of a very significant change to your used vs available credit ratio, especially if it was close to the card's limit and you don't have other revolving credit accounts.

Absolutely.

And while people may not think it's "fair" or "right", realize that actuaries analyze real-world payment history to come to these conclusions. That data is real world actions of people. If someone doesn't normally have a big credit card balance, and suddenly they have a huge one, they're simply much more likely to default than if someone is consistently using and paying their cards in that manner.

 

[ultrarunner]

Most likely that was because of a very significant change to your used vs available credit ratio, especially if it was close to the card's limit and you don't have other revolving credit accounts.

I called the credit card company and said I would like to put my entire new roof on the card which would max it out... credit card company said not a problem.

My other accounts are always paid in full and most are not even used... but yes... it was a significant charge of over 20k which was paid when the statement arrived... never did I expect a 50+ point drop.

 

[ishiboo]

I called the credit card company and said I would like to put my entire new roof on the card which would max it out... credit card company said not a problem.

My other accounts are always paid in full and most are not even used... but yes... it was a significant charge of over 20k which was paid when the statement arrived... never did I expect a 50+ point drop.

All the credit bureau sees is your balance is typically low, one month it's $0 and the next month it's $20,000 and maxed out... definitely appropriate! Unfortunately the way the reporting works, it doesn't take into account if you pay it every month... a balance at that time is still a balance at that time.

Unless the owner of the roofing company was an idiot, you should have been able to get a cash discount better than any credit card rebate. In addition to them paying the 2-2.5%, issuing a $20,000 chargeback if you were unhappy with the roof would have been a killer!

 

[murphy1244]

Experian always gives me a hard time over my free report. They don't like doing it online like the other 2.

 

[ishiboo]

Experian always gives me a hard time over my free report. They don't like doing it online like the other 2.

And that's on Annual Credit Report.com - Home Page How do they give you a hard time?

 

[KennyG]

I've had Experian problems also - sometimes they say they need more verification of identity and require you to send in documentation like a birth certificate to get the report.

 

[murphy1244]

I've had Experian problems also - sometimes they say they need more verification of identity and require you to send in documentation like a birth certificate to get the report.

I got the same crap from them.

 

[CCWKen]

I got the same crap from them.

Ditto here too. I got my reports in PDF format online about two months ago short the Experian report. They asked for something. I don't remember exactly but I think it was for additional identity verification or the like. At the time, I thought they were fishing for data. I just didn't get their report. They can go pound salt.

 

[ultrarunner]

All the credit bureau sees is your balance is typically low, one month it's $0 and the next month it's $20,000 and maxed out... definitely appropriate! Unfortunately the way the reporting works, it doesn't take into account if you pay it every month... a balance at that time is still a balance at that time.

Unless the owner of the roofing company was an idiot, you should have been able to get a cash discount better than any credit card rebate. In addition to them paying the 2-2.5%, issuing a $20,000 chargeback if you were unhappy with the roof would have been a killer!

It seems like everything around here is paid for with plastic... seldom a break for a check and many simply do not want to accept checks or large bills when it is cash.

The Christmas Tree sales are running about 92% plastic with about 4% each cash or check.

One of the single family rentals I manage is rented to students... really no issues but all of them pay in cash each month their portions... everytime I get a new teller they comment on the cash deposit and I say look at the account history and you will see the same about going in...

It's almost like cash is shunned...