Discover offers $200 secured credit card with a Fico of 790, 50K in credit limits and 1% utilization?!

[Poor Bastard]

I currently have 3 personal cards I've had for several years with credit limits as follows:

Amex: 30K

NFCU: 10K

Wells Fargo: 10K

Fico of 790, no missed payments ever. Utilization of 1% though I was carrying high balances and paying them off monthly which kept my score around 700, so perhaps that has something to do with the Discover response. I wanted to see what offers were available with no impact to credit score and ran Apple Card and Discover Card preapproval. Apple Card came back and offered a $5000 limit, no biggie there.

 

But then Discover comes back and offers me a $200 secured card to "build my credit". Any idea what could account for that type of thing?

 

Thanks

[FoxSamual]

Be curious to see if you get a different offer from Disco with utilization now low, although, you prolly have to wait some unknown amount of time for the old app to age out of their system before you try again.

 

5k from Apple Card surprises me with your limits on other cards and fico, I've seen way more generous starting lines.  Did you do them with the high utilization too?  Curious if this represents them finally cracking down or if you just got dinged as a risk because of utilization.

 

[shifter]

Are you sure the balances have updated on TU? They are notoriously slow to update and I believe both of those use TU for preapps. 

[hegemony]

are you opted out? perhaps discovery couldn't pre-screen you. NBD, however, as it is one of the worse issuers this side of Uranus.

[hdporter]

Might be that Discover has your credit data from a recent screening pull and didn’t update for this prescreen.  That’s the only way I can make sense of this.

 

Another less likely possibility would involve how recently you paid those balances and if they fear that you assumed new debt that hasn’t reported yet.  (Were you to do a cold app for the unsecured card and denied, this might be a good subject to discuss on recon).

 

Discover some has some very good intro offers, but as @hegemony suggests, ultimately the card’s best utility is in lining your sock drawer.

[MP80]

4 hours ago, Poor *Admin and our Terms of Service prohibit profanity* said:

But then Discover comes back and offers me a $200 secured card to "build my credit". Any idea what could account for that type of thing?

Hey, @poor blue shirt! 

 

A few years back when you had a distaste saga with Chase, just wondering if any effects of that being surfaced via Nessie.

[Poor Bastard]

Thanks all. Ya I have ZERO interest in Discover, was just curious what I would be offered now that my score shot back up. I'd like to get higher credit lines so when I use my credit it does not impact my score so much, but will look to other cards for that or maybe just get increases with NFCU and Wells Fargo. To answer the question asked - yes, I am sure my score has now hit all 3 agencies, I checked. Perhaps another thing that impacts is I have had a lot of soft pulls lately for insurance, and also checked Apple both before and after the score increase showed up on all (3) CRA's.

[Poor Bastard]

1 minute ago, MP80 said:

Hey, @poor blue shirt! 

 

A few years back when you had a distaste saga with Chase, just wondering if any effects of that being surfaced via Nessie.

I don't know what "Nessie" is but it was that incident with Chase that made me decide to just stick with the 3 I had for a while. Interesting thought!

[MP80]

5 minutes ago, Poor *Admin and our Terms of Service prohibit profanity* said:

I don't know what "Nessie" is but it was that incident with Chase that made me decide to just stick with the 3 I had for a while. Interesting thought!

Haha... Sorry! I called LexisNexis "Nessie" to refer to Loch Ness. 

[Poor Bastard]

5 hours ago, hegemony said:

are you opted out? perhaps discovery couldn't pre-screen you. NBD, however, as it is one of the worse issuers this side of Uranus.

I never answered this one. I did in fact opt out but that was 10 years ago wild ass guess. I was under the impression that had to be renewed every 3 years. 

[FoxSamual]

16 hours ago, hegemony said:

are you opted out? perhaps discovery couldn't pre-screen you.

I'm opted out and can still run myself through pre-screen sites. 🤷‍♂️

 

 

[hegemony]

36 minutes ago, FoxSamual said:

I'm opted out and can still run myself through pre-screen sites. 🤷‍♂️

 

 

with current creditors?

 

the whole point of opting out is it puts your file in the pre-screened suppression file. There really is no reason for a person to opt-out unless they are afraid of mail.

[nemo]

2 hours ago, hegemony said:

There really is no reason for a person to opt-out unless they are afraid of mail.

 

Fear isn't a fair characterization.  It's for people who don't want mail.  For example, I travel full time and have to have all my mail forwarded to wherever I am, so mail costs me money.

[hegemony]

1 hour ago, nemo said:

 

Fear isn't a fair characterization.  It's for people who don't want mail.  For example, I travel full time and have to have all my mail forwarded to wherever I am, so mail costs me money.

fair enough. but then I hope you have also opted out of the DMA.

[nemo]

20 minutes ago, hegemony said:

fair enough. but then I hope you have also opted out of the DMA.

 

Yes, that's also essential.  I did that before I even knew I could opt out of pre-screening.

 

The remaining mail I get is pretty much limited to mail from companies where I've switched to electronic delivery, but they still insist on sending certain things physically.  (That and renewed credit cards.)

[FoxSamual]

5 hours ago, hegemony said:

with current creditors?

 

New ones.

 

5 hours ago, hegemony said:

There really is no reason for a person to opt-out unless they are afraid of mail.

 

I don't want my PII in a million different databases.  That's a million different ways for it to be breached/lost/stolen. 🤷‍♂️

[shifter]

6 hours ago, hegemony said:

the whole point of opting out is it puts your file in the pre-screened suppression file.

Yes for unsolicited purchase. But when you login to their site and provide your info, you grant them permission to run your credit just like any normal app. Now if your credit is frozen, they will not pull through the freeze, but that's different. 

[FoxSamual]

14 minutes ago, shifter said:

Now if your credit is frozen, they will not pull through the freeze, but that's different. 

I can get pre-screens through a freeze, which is a little scary and kinda proves the freeze is useless from a data protection/privacy standpoint, but there you go.

 

 

[shifter]

3 hours ago, FoxSamual said:

I can get pre-screens through a freeze, which is a little scary and kinda proves the freeze is useless from a data protection/privacy standpoint, but there you go.

 

 

Mmmm. No. Never seen it. 

[centex]

Have you ever had credit issues with DISC that, although no longer on the reports, remain in the internal servers?  

[Poor Bastard]

9 hours ago, centex said:

Have you ever had credit issues with DISC that, although no longer on the reports, remain in the internal servers?  

Nope. Never even had a Discover card.

[hdporter]

Since you’re unlikely to apply via a pre-screened offer, best to write this off as a fluke and forget about it.  It’s unlikely to have any weight should you cold app for a card.

[butterflywings]

My daughter last week, 3 days after she turned 18yrs, and still a junior in HS, with no credit history, applied for a Discover Student credit card. They gave her a $1500 limit. I'm shocked.

 

She applied for it because she wants to begin and build a credit history. She's a dual enrollment student, she's taking college classes.

 

(fwiw, she started school @ age 6yrs, that's why she's 18yrs and a junior) 

 

 

[shifter]

1 hour ago, butterflywings said:

They gave her a $1500 limit. I'm shocked.

Congrats! That's what student cards are good for! 

[RehabbingANDBlabbing]

Ok I will say that Discover has recently changed their underwriting criterion over maybe the past 9 months. I think they see the writing on the wall regarding the economy, so they have made it more difficult to obtain one of their cards. I've been trying to get one for my DH in the hopes of getting a BT offer and a 10% cash back bonus for a year, but they keep denying him for too many inquiries or too many newly opened accounts. They used to approve just about anyone for an unsecured card, let alone the secured one. Now, they won't even give him a reapproval for the secured. And as far as who they are pulling for the reapproval, I know they pull Experian, but they may also look at TransUnion and perhaps Equifax in some cases. But you can get an offer with only Experian being unfrozen.