Received Approved Card, what does this really mean?

[RED_Knives]

Its funny because I was thining about getting an Amex card and I was just sent one in the mail yesterday. Every card I have been sent in the mail I have always gotten accepted.

Does this mean when they say your preapproved you actually are? or are they lieing, did they do a soft pull to find out?

[user5387]

It typically means that they asked a credit bureau like EX to supply them with a list of people who meet certain criteria.

There's no guaranteed approval.  If you are approved, there's no guarantee of favorable APRs or CLs or anything like that.

I wouldn't be flattered by such offers.  Some people get a ton of these offers, and some like me almost never get any.

[RobertEG]

Yes, it is a bit strange to simply have been sent the card without actually applying.

A creditor can submit to a CRA a request for listing of consumers who meet specified criteria, and must then make all on that listing a "firm offer for credit" which they must honor if the consumer then applies, and the consumer is found to meet those criteria based on a full review of their credit report.  The inquiry to obtain such a listing is required by FCRA 604(c) to be excluded from any consumer report made available to others (i.e., it must be coded as "soft"), and the creditor cannot receive any account specific information in that pull.  They basicially get only your name and address for purpose of sending the firm offer.

A "firm offer for credit or insurance" is defined in detail in FCRA 603(f).  Thus, receiving pre-approved offers based on a lisitng received from a CRA is a bit more than just junk mail.

The consumer is usually required to then apply to the firm offer, thus granting the creditor permissible purpose to pull the consumer's complete credit report (which can then be coded as "hard").

They apparently considered that being on the lisiting provided by the CRA was sufficient to actually "grant" credit.

However, it is legally kinda strange, since if you did not actually apply, they could not open an account with you until you provided some acceptance.

Thus, sending the card would not activate an account without some other express approval on your part.

Does the accompanying agreement specify that use of the card then constitutes acceptance of terms of their account agreement?

[blondy250]

It's called junk mail, goes right into the shredder. I opted out to stop receiving it.

[lg8302ch]

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@RED_Knives wrote:

Its funny because I was thining about getting an Amex card and I was just sent one in the mail yesterday. Every card I have been sent in the mail I have always gotten accepted.

Does this mean when they say your preapproved you actually are? or are they lieing, did they do a soft pull to find out?

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Are you sure it is not just one of their "fake" sample cards ? A real card you did not apply for? That indeed is strange and this would be for me a reason to call and reverse the whole thing. But I have been receiving these plastic cards from Amex so often and the children love these card and happily play with them..LOL