No Credit Check Checking Accounts
How to Get a No Credit Check Checking Account
If you have good credit, banks will knock down your door to sign you up for a checking account. If you have bad or unverifiable credit, finding a suitable checking account is far from easy. No credit check checking accounts are not exactly falling out of the sky by the dozens.
Here are a few ideas for finding a no credit check checking account:
Build the Relationship with the First Deposit
Banks rely on checking accounts to create relationships with customers. If you are a new customer with questionable credit, and you do not want the bank to even see your credit report, you are going to have to take measures from your side to make a relationship with you appealing for the bank.
Especially if you have been in the past or are currently in Chex Systems (the banking system’s equivalent of a casino’s blacklist), strive to make an impression with your first deposit. For example, you could bring your last two paychecks, uncashed, into the bank, and ask to directly put them into your new account.
By all means necessary, show your reliability in other ways if you cannot show it on paper in the form of a solid credit report.
Keep It Regular
Banks want to pull your credit report before doing any business with you whatsoever. It’s an instinct of the banking animal. If you are seeking a no credit check checking account, then, you’re asking for a favor.
And you just might get one. But you likely won’t get two favors.
Therefore, seek to keep everything regular after the initial no credit check favor has been done. Don’t overdraft the account, don’t overfill the account, don’t totally empty the account. Don’t do anything that will call attention to you or your account.
Keep it nice and simple and low maintenance for the bank. Fly under the radar.
Explain But Do Not Excuse Poor Credit History
If you request a no credit check checking account, it’s safe to assume that the bank is going to assume the worst about what your credit history might reveal. Otherwise, why would you object to a credit check?
It’s wise, then, to have an explanation on hand as to why your credit score or situation is not ideal. Perhaps a job loss, foreclosure, bankruptcy, or messy divorce has ruined your credit. Realize, if that sounds familiar, that millions of people have suffered such misfortunes. In 2009 alone, bankruptcy filings are projected to reach 1.4 million, the highest totals since the bankruptcy law changes of 2005.
Explain what happened while not excusing it away. Bankers are human, too. Perhaps they have experienced a credit disaster of their own at some point in time; surely they know someone who has credit problems.
Make it clear that your credit score is not the best representation of your value as a bank customer. Ask them to judge your request for an account by other measures, and then tell them what those measures should be.
Source:
Andy Sullivan and Tom Hals • Bankruptcy Filings Surge in First-Half 2009 • Aug 13, 2009 • Reuters:
