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From: jik@athena.mit.edu (Jonathan I. Kamens)
Newsgroups: alt.hackers,misc.consumers
Subject: Re: credit 'fixing'
Message-ID: <1991Feb22.045410.1721@athena.mit.edu>
Date: 22 Feb 91 04:54:10 GMT
References: <1991Feb21.154633.20781@bronze.ucs.indiana.edu>
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In article <1991Feb21.154633.20781@bronze.ucs.indiana.edu>, jkonrath@silver.ucs.indiana.edu (jon) writes:
|> ok, maybe this isnt a good question for here, but im sure maybe one
|> of you knows what im talking about...

  This has been discussed before in misc.consumers, and misc.consumers is
probably a much better newsgroup to discuss it, so I've directed followups
there.

|> in a lot of these tabloid magazines you see ads like:
|> 
|> 'fix your credit history! send xx dollars to...'
|> 
|> im just wondering what 'fixing' entails and if anyone knows how to
|> do this. it seems like any pud off the street who can put an ad in
|> the enquirer can do this, so why can't i?

  There are two main approaches they take (that I know of).

  One of them is to issue you a debit credit card.  A debit card is a card
where you deposit a starting balance in a bank account at the bank issuing the
card, and your credit limit is the amoung of money you deposit.  If you don't
pay, they take the money out of the account.  The idea, supposedly, is that if
you keep this account for a long time and manage to pay off the bills every
month reliably, it will show up in your credit history.

  The other is much less legal.  They access the records of a credit agency
like TRW, searching for someone with the same name as you who has a better
credit history.  Then, they give you that person's social security number and
tell you to use it whenever applying for credit from now on.  You give your
name and the other guy's social security number, and when they look up your
history they see the other guy's.  If you don't do anything obnoxious, the
other guy probably won't ever notice; if you do, you just might get caught,
and the company that told you to do this might too.

-- 
Jonathan Kamens			              USnail:
MIT Project Athena				11 Ashford Terrace
jik@Athena.MIT.EDU				Allston, MA  02134
Office: 617-253-8085			      Home: 617-782-0710


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