Lovely, Black's Law, the voice of reason. The first one, "detriment' is key and nothing in the answer to that question is a detriment to anyone, they can verify it and as long as he is not obtaining credit with the intent to take the money and skip town, no detriment, therefore no fraud.
Second one,"leads another to enter into a transaction" you are the application, you are not leading anyone to enter into anything as the power of decision to grant credit is not yours and again brings us back to no intent, no reliance on you and therefore no inducement.
Third one, "induce a reasonable person to assent" your answer is not the decison making factor, its their decision based on yoru credit review and "injuring the other party" which again brings us to the issue stated above in fraud, no injury, no intent, no fraud or "material" breach.
The fact is that everything listed here is designed to protect individuals and businesses under the UCC and Statue of Fraud from improper gain when two parties are on equal footing, bilateral if you will, in the case of credit, there is no bilateral, its unilateral as the decision to grant credit is not yours, its theirs. Life insurance is a different animal and doesn't factor in this discussion as it was never an issue of discussion and is treated completely differently and is governed by completely different disclosure laws, but since you chose to bring it up, let me elaborate on that. Even then it is the responsiblity of the insurance company to conduct medical evaluation, pull your MIB and then underwrite accordingly. Its only the fly by night insurance companies that don't ask questions, or run tests, or anything and whatever loss they suffer under the law is mitigated by their failure to take proper steps. Legitimate companies will always do their due diligence to perform discovery before exposure to risk.
@eyebleave1 wrote:Okay, so now that we have established lying as unethical and potentially actionable and given Guardian his jollies, what are the other options available?
Simply answer the question, leave it blank, or provide an explanation? Are there other options I am missing, what are the most likely outcomes of the scenarios and does anyone have any experience they care to share?
What happen to the love? 
But seriously I am done with this, people have their views and this wasn't supposed to get into a whole logistical discussion and people can believe and choose to do what they want ultimately. This was not a matter of lie or do not lie, lying is never right but answering something that no obligation is due is also wrong.
For a long time applications for employment, military and so on asked what your religion was, if you were gay and this was found to be unconstitutional and therefore removed. In this case, the law needs to require that they ask what the statute allows and that is "Do you have a bankruptcy (dischaged or not)" the answer would be yes if its still on your report and no if not, or "Have you declared bankruptcy in the last 7 years" then it respects the SOL and you say yes or no accordingly. The open ended question of "Have you EVER" is frankly illegal and you have a right to not answer it but its also like a cop asking if they can come inside and you say no excersing your right, you must be guilty or have something to hide and if you say yes and they find something then you have given up your right to improper search and seizure when you go to court, what do you do?
This was designed to answer a question in a practical manner and then to clarify it, not to get jolies or justify lying, if that's how its taken, then the whole point of this discussion was missed and frankly I am disappointed I even dedicated this much time to it.
@wilee wrote:
So...back to my first post on the topic. Write your legislative reps and have the question explicitly prohibited beyond the terms of the FCRA.
Yeah we'll get right on that, as soon as we can find someone not in the pockets of the lobbyist, big corporations and being indicted for fraud and taking kick backs. You have way too much faith in your reps or just taking the easy way of saying if someone else isn't going to protect me, I am just going to go along with the flow and get hurt. Make sense to you? Most laws get passed due to some degree of disobedience and refusal to go with the flow that ends up in the high courts and those decisions set standards that the rest benefit from. Rarely has there been a law that got passed because reps took what people said and ran it up the pole to get it passed, most of them don't serve long enough to survive the bureaucracy and if they even attempt to go to the bat, they will end up collapsing under political pressure or simply run its course and then someone else won't pick up where they left off. In principle and in a perfect world, I agree with you 100% that people who are supposed to be serving the people should do something but in practice, that never happens. Disappointing and frustrating to say the least. I guess to each their own, make your own choices and be prepared to face whatever comes next.
Guardian - with all due respect you stated that you are a lawyer. That means when someone who is a total stranger to the law reads your statement that saying no in this instance is not fraud, they are relying on that statement to be true. Saying no to the question posed in OP is fraud. Granted, nothing may come of it, in fact, nothing probably would come of it. However, the unsuspecting reader who reads "it is not fraud" should also be told that should it come to light that they in fact did have a bk 10, 20, heck even 30 years ago, there are possible ramifications from not answering honestly. You said the the bk becomes moot because it's off the credit report in 7-10 years, true from that standpoint. However, is the actual record of the bk purged? No. The bank or whatever who performs their due diligence and goes the extra step and performs a public records search will find that BK. Then the bank knows you weren't entirely honest and may decide to decline to extend you credit. I'm in commercial litigation, Iboth plaintiff and defendant. 've been on both sides of the fence here. For the informative intent behind these forums all information should provided. Whether someone agrees with it or not.
As for our so called legislative reps, they are the ones that write these codes, statutes, regulations, and various acts in such a way that even highly educated trained judges have a hard time figuring out what they meant. Judges are required to apply the law as written, the problem is that judges read the same law differently. It's a mess. For every judge that says this would be a case of fraud, there will be another who says it isn't. As Guardian said make your own choices and be prepared for what comes next.
And to Gaurdian, had this been an actual trial to the court would it now be time for our happy hour? 
@kjm79 wrote:Guardian - with all due respect you stated that you are a lawyer. That means when someone who is a total stranger to the law reads your statement that saying no in this instance is not fraud, they are relying on that statement to be true. Saying no to the question posed in OP is fraud. Granted, nothing may come of it, in fact, nothing probably would come of it. However, the unsuspecting reader who reads "it is not fraud" should also be told that should it come to light that they in fact did have a bk 10, 20, heck even 30 years ago, there are possible ramifications from not answering honestly. You said the the bk becomes moot because it's off the credit report in 7-10 years, true from that standpoint. However, is the actual record of the bk purged? No. The bank or whatever who performs their due diligence and goes the extra step and performs a public records search will find that BK. Then the bank knows you weren't entirely honest and may decide to decline to extend you credit. I'm in commercial litigation, Iboth plaintiff and defendant. 've been on both sides of the fence here. For the informative intent behind these forums all information should provided. Whether someone agrees with it or not.
As for our so called legislative reps, they are the ones that write these codes, statutes, regulations, and various acts in such a way that even highly educated trained judges have a hard time figuring out what they meant. Judges are required to apply the law as written, the problem is that judges read the same law differently. It's a mess. For every judge that says this would be a case of fraud, there will be another who says it isn't. As Guardian said make your own choices and be prepared for what comes next.
And to Gaurdian, had this been an actual trial to the court would it now be time for our happy hour?
My friend, well said. It was deduced that I was an attorney and since it was true, I didn't say anything but I never offered any advise as an attorney to the OP and only the following discussing was done in the spirit of legal discussion as an attorney. 
This is not a client relationship but simply as a person on a credit forum who happens to be a lawyer.
As a fellow attorney I am sure you can appreciate the fact that although they can do their due diligence and perform public record search and the record is not gone, true, their authority when it comes to issuing a credit card only goes so far. Now with more extensive lines of credit or mortgage or whatever, then yeap its more likely. Ultimately its an individuals choice what to say and take their chances. As you said, no one interprets the law the same or there wouldn't be a need for appellate courts and supreme court and judicial review in general.
Now, it would be time for happy hour, so who is buying? 
How about I get the first round, you get the second, what's your poison? At the end of the day, adverserial system or not, friends meet in court all the time, just gotta know to separete profession from personal. I sit across the table from friends all the time and often we end up across the table and just gotta know how to push each other's buttons without making it personal. How do you like commercial litigation? What do you focus on primarily?
@ScoreBooster wrote:BTW, I'd love to know what % of credit-applications are actually filled out 100% accurate. I guess not many. BK is just one aspect, but what about the people "tuning" their income just to make sure they get approved? Or the time at job? Or the time at address? The list goes on and on...
Wow, if all these contracts that aren't accurate would be void, how many would actually still be valid?
Good point, if we split hair then likely much of them wouldn't hold. Hence why they have the right and obligation to verify through legally available means. That's not to say that people should go and lie but how else would credit card companies issue cards to dogs and 6 months old children? someone dropped the ball and didn't do their job.
Back in high school we took a field trip to the state court house to watch a jury trial (it was a personal injury case). The plaintiff's attorney and the defendant's attorney held nothing back. They went so far as to attack the credibility of counsel, e.g. underhanded tactics at deposition, withholding evidence, in front of the jury no less (the judge didn't like that so much). But I remember that during the lunch recess both attorneys were sitting together at a little corner table at the cafe we had lunch at. They were laughing and cracking jokes, but once back in the court room, it was like watching Jekyll and Hyde. I didn't understand it at the time.
My focus? That's supposed to mean one area of law right? I've done construction lit., securities & RICO violations, (imagine a clearing the throat sound) contracts (and yes ScoreBooster, there are only a handful of valid contracts out there, and even then you can still find ways around them), personal injury/wrongful death (only serious cases though, not your typical rearenders), employment agreements, and even some asset protection.
@kjm79 wrote:Back in high school we took a field trip to the state court house to watch a jury trial (it was a personal injury case). The plaintiff's attorney and the defendant's attorney held nothing back. They went so far as to attack the credibility of counsel, e.g. underhanded tactics at deposition, withholding evidence, in front of the jury no less (the judge didn't like that so much). But I remember that during the lunch recess both attorneys were sitting together at a little corner table at the cafe we had lunch at. They were laughing and cracking jokes, but once back in the court room, it was like watching Jekyll and Hyde. I didn't understand it at the time.
My focus? That's supposed to mean one area of law right? I've done construction lit., securities & RICO violations, (imagine a clearing the throat sound) contracts (and yes ScoreBooster, there are only a handful of valid contracts out there, and even then you can still find ways around them), personal injury/wrongful death (only serious cases though, not your typical rearenders), employment agreements, and even some asset protection.
Yeah it seems that way sometimes but the fact is that you learn its nothing personal when it comes to litigation, that one has nothing to do with the other. I know families where husband and wife are on opposite sides of the table, imagine how fun that is. 
Yeah I mean what seems to be bulk of your cases. I like that tongue in cheek statement, good one. Nice, you have a pretty fun plate it seems. A nice mix. Pretty sure your RICO violations are federal but what jurisdiction do you mostly find yourself? district I assume? Anyway great to meet you, glad to have you around, at least now I know who I can count on to either back me up or challenge me