taterman

Seeing that the Barclays US Airways card will soon no longer be available, and that they don't offer a business version anymore, I was wondering if it would be possible to sign up for their personal card using my EIN. I already received the personal card recently and I thought I could get another through my EIN. Anyone see a problem with this? I believe some business applications only ask for the EIN instead of the SSN anyway, right? Does the EIN behave like the SSN in this way? I have other business cards under this number.

Thanks!

So I got a little impatient waiting for replies and decided to go ahead and give it a shot.

I filled out the application just like I would for a personal account but used my EIN instead of SSN. I felt justified doing this because I truly wanted a US Airways credit card for business use and they don't offer a business one anymore.

Anyway, I got the "we need more time screen" after hitting "apply". I waited a few minutes and then called the reconsideration line to ask if they needed more info from me. The guy was super nice. I guess my EIN pulled my personal credit report and he asked me a bunch of questions regarding my income and the accounts I had on file which I answered truthfully. He told me that I was approved at $5000 and that he needed to transfer me to another representative in order to finish the application.

The next guy asked me the security questions like birthday and mother's maiden name again and then asked for my "social" again. I gave the EIN and he had me repeat the number another two times. At that point he said he needed to send me a letter in the mail to confirm something before we could finish. I asked him if that meant my application was on hold again. He told me that it did and I asked why the other gentleman had told me I was approved. He repeated that he needed to obtain information over mail. I told him I was happy to give him any info he needed over the phone and he just repeated what he said before. Not wanting to ruffle feathers, I thanked him and told him I would be happy to wait for the letter and hung up.

What is going on here? I'm sure it has to do with my EIN but since they had my complete personal credit history in front of them and even complimented me on my creditworthiness, I can't image what they need from me in the mail? Are they just wanting to confirm that I'm not some scammer? Or are they wanting my to prove that my EIN is actually a SSN? If so, why didn't he just confront me about it over the phone? I would have been happy to explain that I was trying to receive this card for business purposes. It was very strange.

philemer

I'm guessing that your card would be in the mail now if you had used your SS #. Personal and/or business spend can go on any card.

taterman

I was approved for my first US Airways card using my SSN only a month ago. There is no way they would have approved a second this soon. Regardless, anyone have any idea what I should be expecting in the mail?

Bump.

sdsearch

Exactly! And you do seem to be a scammer, as you just admitted to us you got another US card only a month ago, but you're trying to not admit that to them and you're trying to trick them into thinking you're someone else.

Keep in mind that banks have all sorts of security procedures, but the front line employees are trained not to tell you that they're asking you questions to get at your identity. So you shouldn't expect an on-the-phone rep to tell you the real reason they're asking you all those questions.

taterman

These cards are notoriously churnable. There are many reports on this very forum of people getting 3 or 4 of them. Being a scammer would imply that I am not who I say I am. Everything I gave them was completely truthful, including my EIN.

I called them back this morning to let them have my SSN and they did confirm that was the problem last night. Unfortunately I was denied because I "already had the card". Oh well. Can't win them all.

Often1

Banks use a lot more than any one name or number to match and any discrepancy is a huge red flag for a fraudster/scammer. Indeed, here they caught out someone they would have immediately denied had he supplied true information in the first place.

taterman

Wowzers, folks. If you look at my original post, you'll see that my original question was to see if it was possible to apply for a personal card with an EIN. People apply for business credit cards everyday with their EIN. This is not unethical and it is obviously encouraged by these companies. I just wanted to know if it was possible to do the same thing with personal cards. Nobody answered my question so I went ahead and gave it a try. Now I'm accused of being a scammer. I'm not feeling super welcome here. I thought it was a legitimate question.

If we're talking about "manipulating the system", I'd expect you to give this same lecture to everyone on this forum who is signing up for credit cards only for the signup bonuses.

Barclays allows people to have more than one of these cards. That's all I was trying to do with a company I legitimately own.

sdsearch

If you read the US card thread carefully, you'll see that only those people who get "instantly" approved (ie, by computer, with no human intervention) ever get approved for a second or third or fourth card. Those people who are talking to humans are pretty much always denied.

So you totally wasted your time with this (as well as wasting a TU pull). You should have either applied online with you SSN and "hoped" for an instant approval, or given up. There are no options for churning the US card!

No. First of all, Barclay humans don't allow people to have more than one of these cards. They've just programmed the computer that processes "instant" approvals online to not bother checking whether you already have one. That's the only loophole.

Second, you were trying to do it by pretending that you weren't the same person, but using another number than your SSN. You were only trying to use your EIN because you expected your SSN to identify you as the person who already had a card.

That's far different than someone applying for a card they already have, giving no misleading information, and getting approved.

Most people would think that supplying an EIN in place of an SSN is misleading information. The form didn't ask for anything other than an SSN, did it? How is an EIN different from a falsified SSN, when entered into a field only asking for an SSN???

taterman

In a business card application, many people legitimately place their SSN where it asks for their EIN. I honestly thought it possibly might be common practice to use the EIN in place of the SSN on an application. I didn't know. That's why I asked on this forum. I even explained to the customer service rep on my second call exactly what I was doing. I told them that because there was no longer a business card available, I was trying to get a second personal one. How can I be accused of scamming when I told the company what I was doing. Just because I realized I wouldn't get a second card with my SSN, doesn't mean I didn't have a legitimate use for the second one.

sdsearch

In a field where it says only to put your EIN, or in a field which says put either your EIN or SSN?

All the business card applications I've looked at (admittedly, only from a couple banks so far) have either had a field where it directs you to put in a SSN if you don't have an EIN, or have separate fields for EIN and SSN.

Please post a link of business card application which asks for an EIN, accepts an SSN in that field, yet says nothing on the application form indicating that an SSN can be entered in the EIN field. Only that would the equivalent of what you found on the Barclay personal card application, which was asking for an SSN, with no mention of EIN being an acceptable substitute.