Cap One

When I applied in 8/00 I got the same message. Then like less than a month later, I got an offer from them for a secured card with a $200 limit w/ a $199 deposit! I decided to take them up on their offer and then like 2 weeks later decided not to and called and canceled my application and requested my money back (they had already cashed my check). That took a long time to get my money back but I eventually did.

 

This might help...

I don't know if this helps but, I applied for a Bank of America card online and I received a message something like that. Today, I received a letter from them in the mail. I need to send proof of my address. An electric bill, credit card statement or I.D. with address. Then they can proceed with my application. They said it was to make sure someone was not trying to steal my identity. I'm kind of glad they do this.

 

LOOKOUT! It's a trap

Don't send them any utility bills as proof of residence.
That MIGHT turn into a trap for you because they MIGHT find out something you didn't want them to know. Profiling, that sort of thing.

Instead of just whipping them off a copy of a utility bill or anything that MIGHT give them any more info than they already have, go to your lawyer, preferably one that knows you well, and tell him that you need to provide proof of residence for a credit card application. Take those same utility bills with you and show them to the lawyer if he don't already know you and where you live personally. Then ask him to make up a notarized statement that your name is BLAH BLAH and that you have appeared before him and provided proof that you live at 9876 somewhere St. in Anytown, SC. (State of Confusion) and that your zip code is 090909

He signs it and notarizes it and you go get one or more photocopies of that and whip it off to them. Who is gonna question the notarized and sworn to statement of an attorney?

And that way you don't take any chance of giving out information that you MIGHT wish you had not given out later.

Make sense?
Most lawyers won't charge much to do that. Mine does it for free.

Bill Bauer

 

Paranoia

They're coming to get you!!! Your flags are filed, Ooops I mean your files are flagged.

They want proof of ID. It's fraud prevention.

breeze

 

Paranoia

Sure it is! You are absolutely right.
I just don't like to give more information about myself than I absolutely have to.

Have you never heard of credit profiling?
They can find out more stuff on you than you ever dreamed of from just about any piece of information you give them.

Paranoia?
I call it being safe instead of sorry later.

Bill Bauer

 

Paranoia and fraud prevention

Breeze, it isn't paranoia. it's prudence.
I'm quite sure you don't deal with your utility bills the way I do. You probably get the bill and just pay it at the earliest possible date.

I don't do that. I always wait until they send me a 48 hour cutoff notice and then if that falls on a weekend, I'll wait till early Monday morning. The last possible momeant to avoid the cutoff. Quite often, I will call them after I get the 48 hour cut off and ask for an extension to boot, maybe a week or two. Then when I can't stretch it any more, I call them up and pay them with a credit card. That automatically puts my actual paydate 4 weeks from the date I gave them the credit card payment. I do everything I can to keep my money in the bank drewing interest for the longest possible time.
Lights, phone, gas, whatever all gets paid by credit card and the payment date is therefore always shoved about 4 weeks into the future. I never pay more than one utility bill per week.

That means that if someone did check my utility bills, I would not get a very good report from them. So I am not going to take a chance on somebody finding out that I am a slow payer any time I can get away with it. And I get away with it every time I can because I like to see that interest growing as much as possible.

You would not even believe what my utility bills run per month, and that kind of money draws big interest every day.

Paranoia? Nah, just making money on money I already spent and keeping others from finding out about it.

Bill Bauer

 

Re: Paranoia and fraud prevent

And if you were to ever need to move and re-establish utility service you would likely need to put down a deposit for every company. Most utility companies will not require a deposit if you can provide a letter of exellent credit from prior utility service. I would think that between late fees and deposits you would loose any potential gain.

Also, I'd be scared something would happen and I wouldn't be able to get to them to pay it on the very last day before service was cut off. Then there'd be a restoral fee to contend with.

My advice: pay your utilities. If you want to play with the float and do it on the last possible day before the due date that'd be fine, but I can't see letting the bills go past due.

 

Re: Paranoia and fraud prevent

Depends on what you are getting on your interest for one thing.