Which credit cards will backdate an authorized user?

[Anonymous]

I apologize if this has been asked repeatedly in the past, but I can't seem to find any recent info.  I want to build my niece's credit score up.  She has a couple of cards, but her average age of account is very poor, causing her score to be low.  If I add her as an authorized user to one of my credit cards, which cards will backdate the account on her credit report so I can improve her average age of account?  I know American Express won't do it, so what cards do?  Thanks for the help!

[Gmood1]

Capital one
Chase
BofA

[simplynoir]

To add to above in my experience:

Synchrony (Walmart/Sam's Club)

Dillards AMEX

[zerofire]

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@Anonymous wrote:

I apologize if this has been asked repeatedly in the past, but I can't seem to find any recent info.  I want to build my niece's credit score up.  She has a couple of cards, but her average age of account is very poor, causing her score to be low.  If I add her as an authorized user to one of my credit cards, which cards will backdate the account on her credit report so I can improve her average age of account?  I know American Express won't do it, so what cards do?  Thanks for the help!

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My short answer to this is "Don't do it". You have to remember that a score is worthless if nobody is checking. Nobody will check unless your niece applies for another card or loan. What do you think a single AU account would do against multiple fresh accounts to a score? Reality is not much. AU's do not have as much value as full accounts and if your niece did apply for a new card would push her into deeper water than she is now teaching her that she can always apply for a new card when she needs more credit. You are better off letting her multiple cards age so she has a solid profile of her own and having Uncle pile on the AU accounts is a poor way of teaching patience.

Now if you are still gunning for it remember that you want only perfectly clean accounts with 10+ years of data and low utalization. You will forever have to control the utalization and if the niece gets too much credit you will be at fault. Lastly make sure that you destroy her card or she really will be able to charge stuff to your account and force you to pay for it. Bank of America, Capitol One, Chase, Citi, and Synchrony's Walmart are most commonly used along with Discover.

[TiggerDat]

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@zerofire wrote:

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@Anonymous wrote:

I apologize if this has been asked repeatedly in the past, blah, blah, blah

blah, blah, blah

Thanks for the help!

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My short answer to this is "Don't do it".      Blah, blah, blah

 Blah, blah

Now if you are still gunning for it remember that you want only perfectly clean accounts with 10+ years of data and low utalization. You will forever have to control the utalization and if the niece gets too much credit you will be at fault. Lastly make sure that you destroy her card or she really will be able to charge stuff to your account and force you to pay for it. Bank of America, Capitol One, Chase, Citi, and Synchrony's Walmart are most commonly used along with Discover.

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Why is it someone else's fault if the niece gets into trouble later.  I agree it might not be teaching her patience and other things, but I don't get line reasoning of responsibility there.   The niece is ultimately in control of her own actions and responsible for her decisions.  The uncle/aunt did not hold a gun to her head and say get that new American Airlines card with 50,000 bonus miles.......

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the info everyone, gonna try with my Chase card and see if that works.  Does anyone happen to know if Citibank would work too?

[archliberal]

barclaycard backdated AUs that I added.

[Anonymous]

USAA backdates AU's. Did this for both my daughters and of coarse took ownership of the cards. lol

[Anonymous]

Ok so a quick update on this, I tried it with my Barclays card and my Chase card.  Barclays asked for my niece's social security number and Chase didn't, and when I tried to give it to Chase they said they won't attach a SS# to an authorized user account, but it will still show up on her credit report.  Fast forward a few weeks and the Barclays card shows on her report and is backdated (she receievd an alert from her credit monitoring a day or so after I made the call), but Chase still doesn't show on her report.

For people that have used Chase to backdate as an authorized user, how long did it take for the card to show on the credit report?  And did they ask for a social security number?

[K-in-Boston]

American Express is the only lender that I am aware of that does not (or more correctly, no longer does) backdate AU accounts.  I have backdated AU accounts from Bank of America, Capital One, Chase, Citi, and Discover.

With the AU reporting without a SSN, the CBs will try to match up data submitted by the lender to the appropriate credit report.  Usually if this is a family member living with you (or if the family member has your address as a previous address) it happens seamlessly.  If they're unable to match up the reported AU to a credit record they have on file, it may never appear.