     RichardM (Richard612) | Friday, December 15, 2000 - 09:49 am 
I know what a PRM is. I know what a normal inquiry is. What's an AR and an AM? What do creditors "see" when they do an AR or an AM? |
| Anonymous1 (Anonymous1) | Friday, December 15, 2000 - 10:20 am
AR is when your creditor is reviewing your account to see if they will extend more credit or see if you are digging a financial hole. It is used to basically keep tabs on their customers. |
| Patricia Holly (Househunting) | Friday, December 15, 2000 - 10:28 am
AR=Account Review or AM=Account Maintenance. Both are "soft hits" similiar to the PRM=Promotional inquiries. |
| RichardM (Richard612) | Friday, December 15, 2000 - 10:44 am
What does the creditor get to see when they do the AM/AR?
I ask this because I will be speaking with a manager of my credit union later today. I want to discuss their usage of hard inquiries every time they feel they need to look at my credit.
If I apply for a credit line increase or a new line of credit with a creditor that I already have lines of credit with, is it necessary for them to do these hard inquiries every time? Would an AM/AR suffice for their purposes? What are the guidelines for doing an AM/AR pull versus a hard inquiry?
Question #2 ... They don't seem too inclined to share my score and the reason codes with me. They said that I can contact Equifax for that information! :-O :-O :-O Are they premitted by law and by their contracts with the CRA's to share that information in conjunction with an application for credit?
Lastly, does a consumer have any recourse at all when a creditor does a hard inquiry where an AM/AR would've sufficed? |
| Shylock (Shylock) | Saturday, December 16, 2000 - 06:48 am
The answers are that a creditor that does an AR gets a full credit report complete in every detail and that is no different from a chargable inquiry.
The law requires a creditor to indicate the purpose for which they are requesting your credit report and "certify that it will be used for no other purpose." [FCRA 607(a)]
There is no reason why a creditor can't give you your score; provided, however, that they explain what your score means to them in connection with a credit transaction. To simply say, "You got a 670, kid." is not enough. They would need to say, "You got a 670 and we extend more credit to people who score 660 and above" or "You scored a 670 and we don't extend credit to people who score less than 680."
Of course a potential creditor might consider their underwriting criteria to be proprietary in a top secret kind of way and refuse to give you their underwriting criteria. In that case they shouldn't give you the score either because of contractual concerns between Fair Isaac, the Credit Reporting Agencies and the creditor. |
