topic Re: Excessive inquiries in General Credit Topics

Excessive inquiries

Anonymous — Wed, 16 Jan 2013 20:23:25 GMT

I found this forum while searching Google about excessive credit inquries.

My wife and I applied for credit at a furniture store right after Christmas. They had a no interest, no down payment offer going. We were denied when the store ran our credit. Her score is around 775 and mine is around 725.

We got letters in the mail this week from one of the CRAs (I assume that stands for credit reporting agency). It listed our credit score and said something about excessive inquiries. We did refinance our house and closed in the middle of December, and I traded my car on December 26th and financed a truck. I know those are "hard" inquries and don't help, but I didn't think that two hard inquries in December would hurt our ability to get credit that badly. Plus, shouldn't it only count as one hard credit pull if the car dealer or the mortgage company pulled it a few times in one day looking for the best rate?

Thanks!

Re: Excessive inquiries

Revelate — Wed, 16 Jan 2013 20:44:07 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
I found this forum while searching Google about excessive credit inquries.

My wife and I applied for credit at a furniture store right after Christmas. They had a no interest, no down payment offer going. We were denied when the store ran our credit. Her score is around 775 and mine is around 725.

We got letters in the mail this week from one of the CRAs (I assume that stands for credit reporting agency). It listed our credit score and said something about excessive inquiries. We did refinance our house and closed in the middle of December, and I traded my car on December 26th and financed a truck. I know those are "hard" inquries and don't help, but I didn't think that two hard inquries in December would hurt our ability to get credit that badly. Plus, shouldn't it only count as one hard credit pull if the car dealer or the mortgage company pulled it a few times in one day looking for the best rate?

Thanks!

Welcome to the forums!

Actually for both mortgage and definitely for auto shopping, it's not unusual to have a whole lot of inquiries generated. You are absolutely correct that they are rolled up and counted as one from a FICO scoring perspective; however, they're listed individually on reports.

This is a common issue actually, several lenders systems don't seem to be able to recognize the difference and see the numerous inquiries and deny the application as a result. Usually with credit card applications one simply calls in, explains the situation, and can often get a second look; however, in this case, I'm not certain you have a lot of recourse given the sale is probably since past (or said items now sold).

Re: Excessive inquiries

Anonymous — Wed, 16 Jan 2013 20:52:58 GMT

The sale was only for five days, but they told us if we came back and were able to get approved, they would honor the same deal. The items have to be ordered either way, so we're good there too.

I'm assuming I should call the bank that the furniture store goes through? I believe it was GE Capital.

Re: Excessive inquiries

Revelate — Wed, 16 Jan 2013 20:58:13 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
The sale was only for five days, but they told us if we came back and were able to get approved, they would honor the same deal. The items have to be ordered either way, so we're good there too.

I'm assuming I should call the bank that the furniture store goes through? I believe it was GE Capital.

That's what I'd do; it's certainly worth a shot, I'd ask the furniture store for contact details.

It'd also be worth a look at your report (whichever one they pulled) to have the same information they're looking at in front of you while you explain.

Re: Excessive inquiries

RobertEG — Wed, 16 Jan 2013 22:07:26 GMT

The bank should have a better understanding of the credit reporting system.

While the multiple inquiries are shown in your credit report, they will hopefully understand the same logic used by Fair Isaac in the "de-duping" of auto or mortgage shopping inquiries in their scoring. The logic is that shopping around for such purchases is both expected and prudent, and is thus not a negative reflection of a consumer's credit risk.

Re: Excessive inquiries

Anonymous — Thu, 17 Jan 2013 14:16:23 GMT

I called the bank yesterday after I read your replies here. Of course I got the "We can't even see your credit report or why you were denied" stuff from them, and they suggested calling the CRA, which is Trans Union in this case. I did pull my credit report last night and there is only one hard pull for the home refi and there are about three for the auto loan. I'm wondering if I should even bother trying to get TU to combine those into one hard inquiry?

Re: Excessive inquiries

RobertEG — Thu, 17 Jan 2013 17:24:39 GMT

Dont bother.

They are three separate inquiries, and they are bound to retain them as such. The CRA cannot aribtrarily alter accurate information.

The fact that FICO only scores them as one is not a CRA issue.