Failed Credit check.- Has anyone ever succesfully got to the bottom of why?

[Davemac1]

Hi. Applied for a pay monthly deal with vodafone through CPW.

Declined the next day because a credit check was failed. Then started the complete joke of trying to ascertain why. Contact CPW.They say contact Vodafone. Contact Vodafone. They say contact CPW. contact vodafone again.They say check credit score with Equifax. Check score with equifax.Score excellent with absolutely no issues.

Is there no way of finding the footprint of this credit check. I know one was carried out by vodafone because its on the report. What happened next is anyones guess. Did vodafone send CPW the results? Did CPW get the results but their systems somehow declined it?

Search google and it is littered with tales of credit check failures from voda from customers with excellent scores. It must me costing them a fortune in non starters! And even worse,they really dont seem to care.

[hrym]

You're very unlikely to get an answer for the refusal not specifically because of secrecy but because no-one wants fraudsters gaming the system.  It's the same as not discussing your security arrangements.

I'm pretty sure that, if you did try to upgrade, the credit refusal would show up.  It's an odd one, as you must have passed originally to get the contract you have.   Have you changed any of your details since then?  As I mentioned before, time at your present and previous address/es and being on the electoral register can have a bearing.  It's also possible that there was am error in the address or its layout when it was entered by CPW, although that usually comes up as no match for the check.

[chistery]

Are Vodafone able to tell you if the credit check was performed to add a new account, or another number to your existing account? I wonder if that would make a difference?

[Davemac1]

Well not a lot to report regarding this. I did get a call from Vodafone sales team, but they were just trying to get me to upgrade and knew nothing about the original issue. Maybe that was there plan all along?

I told them where they can go with their upgrade!

Think I'll just leave it a little while and take my money elsewhere. Far away from Vodafone & CPW.

[AnnS]

Hi @Davemac1

This is confusing, if you received a call from the upgrades team and were already a Vodafone customer, you would have been already credit checked and there would have been no need for any further credit check. 

Carphone should have had no reason for not being able to upgrade the same account and not try and sell a new contract with a new number.

As you are an existing customer you should receive a loyalty discount when upgrading direct with Vodafone. 

[Davemac1]

Matters not now. Found a better deal with a different 3rd party and a different network. All gone through and phone out for dispatch as we speak!

So long vodafone. So long CPW!!

[AnnS]

Hi @Davemac1

This has been happening regularly with CPW, you have a perfectly good credit rating and the Carphone check comes back as failed without any valid reason but is accepted with an alternative network.  This has been where there has been may have been a fault on the interface between Carphone and Vodafone and the check has not even been processed, instead of coming back as a fault, the check comes back as declined.

The best thing to do is to go back to Carphone and insist they do a manual check and not a computerised check, you may well find the check goes through.

As previously mentioned, Carphone must be losing Vodafone hundreds probably more potential new Vodafone customers due to their faulty credit checking process and it's surprising someone from Vodafone has not taken this up with Carphone.

[jpeedell]

Hi All, 

   Simular story - all seem to involve Vodafone and the Carphone Warehouse and I suspect a bit more than just an error. 

In 24 hours, both me and my partner both failed credit checks for Vodafone's Amazing Black Friday deals - so amazing in fact - that that no one can get one because they cant pass the credit check. 
Both, me and my partner have excellent credit ratings - and I mean, you can't get better at 999 respectively. No risk of affordablity and no reason at all according to Experian - whom I have a paid monitored account. So, I smell a rat.. Seems I'm not alone and several people had failed the check the day I was in store.. ONLY for vodafone though? 

Now, here's the kicker.. I used the internet to order mine, my partner used the store purchase route - with the same outcome. We don't share accounts either and have no connection financially at all. 

At first I thought this was due to Vodafone having made their quota of new contracts and rather than say we're sold out, just say you dont pass the credit check, but.. we both pass the other networks checks.

As many have said on here, they are bounced around between Vodafone blaming CPW and CPW saying its a Vodafone decsion. eitherway - I'll never use either company again as long as I live, which is a shame as Vodafone were my previous supplier and I had many years of trouble free service from them. 
I called EE today and we are now both proud owners of new phones and a roaming contact that includes Canada and the US too - £7pp is worth in my eyes.. Don't buy cheap - buy quality and if it looks to good to be true, it is! 

Sorry Vodafone, you really need to fix this with CPW, both of you are losing more than customers in a market where reputation is key..

[ToniCa]

No idea whether it's relevant here, but a number of friends who haven't moved house in the last 30 years are suddenly being required to produce evidence to their banks that they exist - the one friend who stood her ground, since they had been honouring her cheques for decades, had her account frozen for some weeks, until she finally admitted defeat, and took reams of ID evidence to her bank. Even then, the bank said that the computer said NO initially.

[purrbox]

My clear score was 167 when I got my first mortgage. It reported my credit rating as very poor, they said I would probably even be declined for an ocean credit card. I got a phone contract with three at the same time as the mortgage.

Credit approval works based on what the underwriters think your risk factor is. To save time, agencies use an algorithm that's modelled to detect behaviours of people who are skint / impulsive or both. If you fail that algorithm, it's a decline.

Iif your credit score is low, put an ammendment on your credit file. This means that all credit checks will have to be looked at by a human.

I put an ammendment on my credit file and I'm  now able to pass all credit checks. Things just take longer.

In 99% of cases, your credit score doesn't matter, its how responsible the underwriters think you are. If you are living hand to mouth, the underwriters will sniff that out and decline you.

If you are not living hand to mouth, do my trick and you'll get approved for everything.

[Smufter]

I have recently been declined an upgrade due to a bad credit check.
Have been with Vodafone for the best part of 15 years, two accounts, (mine and the wifes), always paid by direct debit, never had a problem in all that time.
Also have my home broadband with them, which was ordered and installed without problem last year.

I am very careful with regards my credit rating, and subscribe to a couple of credit check agencies, one being Experian, I was advised to check with them as to why my credit was refused, but both show me with the top scores possible. 

A little big of digging shows that "apparently", because I put my works address as the delivery address for my new upgrade handset, a search was done on that address to establish who I was! 

I received an email from Vodafone to explain this, and was advised to put in a new upgrade request.

Needless to say, I haven't bothered, and will be going elsewhere at the end of my contracts.