The Fair Isaac Corporation and their FICO scoring model is trying to fit everyone in America into a little box they feel fairly defines a credit worthy person. Ask any psychologist or sociologist if that can be done with any amount of success and they will clearly say “no”, and point to the current “banking crisis” we find ourselves to be in today. Banks have become lazy. Instead of actually doing their jobs and finding out whether or not Mr. Applicant pays his mortgage on time, how much his employer pays him, and how much cash he has saved up in the bank, they simply rely on a 3-digit number. Doing so saves time during the application process, but as you can see by my services, the process they use to calculate a credit score is riddled with flaws, therefore causing system-wide “loan default prediction” failures; hence home foreclosures and automotive manufactures in financial duress.

I would have been more than happy for you to make my comments public. In fact, I was hoping that you would in order to set the record straight. Many news and media outlets are simply the shameless marketing and distribution arm for large and hegemonic corporations like the Fair Isaac Corporation. It appears, Mr. Smithee, you are no different. This is confirmed by the poor legal interpretation of the Equal Credit Opportunity Act appearing in your article – the Federal Trade Commission clarifies an authorized user does not actually need to have physical access to an account or be related to the primary cardholder in any way ( http://www.ftc.gov and [advertising url removed by editor] ). A similar interpretation of the ECOA was expressed in an article written by a recent Harvard Law graduate, Marshall Silver, in his paper on “Consumer Finance” ( [advertising url removed by editor] )

The “Not-So-Fair-Isaac” Corporation has already released their FICO08 software – a year and a half delayed for legal concerns brought to light by our legal team. If what you say is true, then why are my “authorized user” tradelines still boosting people’s credit scores every single day? The fact is, FICO, the credit reporting agencies, and the credit card companies can’t differentiate between whether or not the AU is related to the primary cardholder in some way, or if the AU actually has physical spending power on the account. That information is currently unavailable to them.

I challenge you; better yet, I dare you, Mr. Smithee, to add one of our cards to your name and see what it does to your credit score. If nothing happens to your score, then fine, everyone will know that piggybacking doesn’t work anymore. On the other hand, when you realize your credit score has gone through the roof, you will be forced to admit this credit score boosting method still works, just as it always has. I truly doubt you have as much dedication to your career and to your readers as this would require, but my God, I hope I am wrong.

- Bill