Does Credit Karma have any connection to mailer offers?

[DaveInAZ]

I'm wondering if CK might be selling your info to folks who send you mailer offers? The whole world and especially CK seems to think I a prime candidate for a personal loan as I carry around $10k in CC balances, under 9% util. It's all 0%, a combination of PIF monthly usage, BTs and intro rates, but they have no way of knowing that I don't pay any CC interest. I was getting 3-4 loan mailer offers monthly and while I don't usually check CK's Recommendations about a month ago I checked and they had 6-8 personal loan offers including "pre-approved offers" from Prosper & Lending Club. Well, I noticed they had my income "estimated" at $57k, with a box to change it & update it. So I did - to only $7k annual income.

Well, naturally the loan offers on CK disappeared, but I also haven't got a loan mailer offer since then. But this week I did get a mailer offer - from a "credit counseling" service in Texas that claimed it could negotiate my CC debt by one half and my minimum payments by 3/4ths. I googled them and found alot of complaints about them on BBB, and the FTC even fined them in 2017 for deceptive practices. But I'm certainly not interested, my Fico scores are in the 730s and I have adequate funds in savings to cover everything.

It just seems a little coincidental to me, and makes sense that CK would go for income by selling your pre-screen info. And yeah, it might not had been the smartest move to tell Ck my annual income is less than my CC debt. I just have an odd sense of humor, and my income is a tad more than that.

[RSX]

This is why CK is free

so yes,these mailers are from them/their partners

[DaveInAZ]

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@RSX wrote:

This is why CK is free

so yes,these mailers are from them/their partners

---

Well, I think their primary income is commissions from getting you to apply for CCs and/or loans. But I guess since the 3 CRAs sell your pre-screen info CK figures it may as well get in on it as well. But it does tick me off they apparently sold my info just based off stated income to a "credit counseling" service with a highly dubious reputation. CK can be a useful tool for monitoring the details in your credit report but yeah, there is a price you pay for "free". I may just close my CK account. I opened a new credit card in July and I must have gotten 6-8 alerts in addition to CK from all the services I have, so I think I'm covered.

[RSX]

Fair points.  It is not needed if you are getting all the free Fico and TU from your existing CC

sounds like the income drop in the system helped reduce the offers, so that could be a strategy as well

if it doesn’t work for you, turf it 

[RobertEG]

The FCRA specificaly bars the use of credit report information obtained from a CRA for any pupose other than the specific permissible purpose for which it was obtained.

No, any vendor who is licensed to obtain credit report information from a CRA is not permitted to sell or otherwise use that information for any commercial purpose.

If you get or dont get pre-screened offers, it is likely a result not of CK selling your information, but rather the result of your name ceasing to appear in a screening listing produced by the CRA itself.

FCRA 604(c) is a special service to potential creditors that is provided under the FCRA, and permits any creditor, including one with which you have no connnection or business, and have not initiated any request for credit, to submit a list of screening criterion to a CRA and obtain from the CRA a listing of consumers whose files have been found to meet the stated screenng criteria.  

It is likely that if your information has changed, then your file no longer meets the general screeing criteria submitted to the CRA, rather than either the CRA or any vendor licensed under the CRA to access to their information, selling your information.

[DaveInAZ]

Thanks Robert, very useful & helpful information as always. But I can't help but think there's some "bending" of the rules here? Since Credit Karma provides your TU & EQ credit reports for free they have to get their income from some use of that information for commercial purpose. Since CK aggressively promotes CCs and personal loans with ratings of your chances of approvals I've always assumed a prime source of income for them is a commission if you're approved for credit when apping from a link on their site - would that not be using info obtained under license from a CRA for commercial purposes? I'm thinking that it's rating your chances of approval that crosses the line, using your info to entice you to apply so that they may profit from your info.

Selling your info to potential creditors would, in my opinion, be a more clear violation in using your info for commercial purpose. The mailer from company claiming to be able to reduce CC debt shortly after I reduced my stated income on CK so low as to be unsustainable for my CC debt just seems very coincidental. Nothing in my CR has changed to indicate that I would be a likely candidate for such a service. Actually the opposite, as 0% BTs & intro rates have expired I've reduced my utilization from 15% at the beginning of the year to under 9%, and there no derogs in my report except for a Ch.7 BK from 2010 still reporting.

[Remedios]

Their money mostly comes from clicking on links to apply for any product listed

It's all about them referral links 😐

[StillKicking]

Within a few days of me creating an account at CCT/Experian to get my Ficos I started receiving mailers...Including pre-approved personal loans from Prosper Lending and several CC offers...

In no way do I believe that is simply a coincidence.

A week or two after CCT I created a CK account and have not received any mailers....

[Anonymous]

That explains the sudden influx of mailers!

[Anonymous]

If you are not paying for the product... "YOU ARE THE PRODUCT".