What are "inquiries" on my credit report?

Whenever you or anyone else asks for a copy of your credit report, the request is supposed to be noted as part of your credit history. If you apply for lots of credit cards in a short time, this will produce a flurry of "inquiry" notes on your credit report. Lenders often turn this around and assume that a flurry of inquiries means you've recently applied for lots of credit, so they turn you down on that basis even though the inference is not strictly valid.

If a lender cites "excessive inquiries" as a reason for turning you down, this is what has happened. The lender has guidelines for how many inquiries in what period of time is too many. Unfortunately, you have no legal right to challenge this policy or even to know what the specific criteria may be.

Don't give your name or address to a merchant until you're actually ready to apply for credit there. Some merchants illegally run credit checks on you as soon as they have your name and address, even though you have not applied for credit, to give them an idea of what to sell you and how. (I'm told many car dealers do this.)

I don't know what legal recourse, if any, you have against unauthorized inquiries.

If lender A sees inquiries from B, C, and D but no new accounts, A may assume that B, C, and D turned you down for credit. Figuring "better safe than sorry," A may then turn you down just because it assumes B, C, and D turned you down. Again, this is a judgment call on the part of A, and you have no legal right to challenge it. If you have not applied for any credit recently but have been, say, looking at cars at several dealerships, you might want to let the lender know this in case it's taking unauthorized inquiries into account. See our information on how to remove inquiries from your credit report.