Complaint Review: Discover Financial Svcs - Wilmington Delaware

Kate there is really no point in me wasting my time arguing with you since you work for them @ the AZ call center.....By the way Kate, "all of us Americans" do not all live in the desert, I attended a high school that was attached to the college and in plain view of the solicitors and there was another high school 2 blocks away) (there was no educational given to me - i only received the rate/privacy information- maybe they have gotten smart about soliciting to minors now and changed this now- i wouldn't know- I am now a business owner and will never honor discover card in my store! I do not choose to accept them because of this, and this is my right.) The next thing they should change is approving minors who do in fact LIE about their birth date- it is fraudulent for anyone to do this but why in the hell would (they do as you have tried to make me look as if that is what my situation is) not verify this information prior to issuing the card, for instance when someone comes into my store and uses their credit card I ask for ID.... Here are some online articles and references to back up some of the points I am making and/or trying to make: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4488488 http://credit.about.com/gi/dynamic/offsite.htm?site=http://www.bankrate.com/brm/news/cc/20000508.asp need some more? You seem like you can't get enough.... http://www.black-collegian.com/news/special-reports/pitfalls2002-2nd.shtml http://www.creditcardnation.com/federal_legislation.html http://www2.hawaii.edu/~hazelb/ContractsII/01-h*o-Capacity%20to%20Contract.doc http://www.responsiblelending.org/practices/ccabuses.cfm

The application I filed did not state you have to be 18 - it was a student application from what i do remember... I just found out from my parents that they got the card in the mail and threw it away, acouple of weeks later discover sent checks, and those are what i used, i never used the card... when i was 16 i was not thinking about this or that the only reson it is an issue now is because after so many years they are suing me from illegaly incured debts ...regardless or not the facts or I was a minor - that is the facts.... i put down 1983- i will be 23 in may and well i guess this is just a costly mistake... i tried to settle with those antagonizing a**hole debt lawyers but they want 3 times what the chargeoff amount was and that is just not going to happen. I am not pay 2178 for - I offered 1700 they wont take it so i will goto court and see if i can get this dismissed some how.....

The application I filed did not state you have to be 18 - it was a student application from what i do remember... I just found out from my parents that they got the card in the mail and threw it away, acouple of weeks later discover sent checks, and those are what i used, i never used the card... when i was 16 i was not thinking about this or that the only reson it is an issue now is because after so many years they are suing me from illegaly incured debts ...regardless or not the facts or I was a minor - that is the facts.... i put down 1983- i will be 23 in may and well i guess this is just a costly mistake... i tried to settle with those antagonizing a**hole debt lawyers but they want 3 times what the chargeoff amount was and that is just not going to happen. I am not pay 2178 for - I offered 1700 they wont take it so i will goto court and see if i can get this dismissed some how.....

The application I filed did not state you have to be 18 - it was a student application from what i do remember... I just found out from my parents that they got the card in the mail and threw it away, acouple of weeks later discover sent checks, and those are what i used, i never used the card... when i was 16 i was not thinking about this or that the only reson it is an issue now is because after so many years they are suing me from illegaly incured debts ...regardless or not the facts or I was a minor - that is the facts.... i put down 1983- i will be 23 in may and well i guess this is just a costly mistake... i tried to settle with those antagonizing a**hole debt lawyers but they want 3 times what the chargeoff amount was and that is just not going to happen. I am not pay 2178 for - I offered 1700 they wont take it so i will goto court and see if i can get this dismissed some how.....

The application I filed did not state you have to be 18 - it was a student application from what i do remember... I just found out from my parents that they got the card in the mail and threw it away, acouple of weeks later discover sent checks, and those are what i used, i never used the card... when i was 16 i was not thinking about this or that the only reson it is an issue now is because after so many years they are suing me from illegaly incured debts ...regardless or not the facts or I was a minor - that is the facts.... i put down 1983- i will be 23 in may and well i guess this is just a costly mistake... i tried to settle with those antagonizing a**hole debt lawyers but they want 3 times what the chargeoff amount was and that is just not going to happen. I am not pay 2178 for - I offered 1700 they wont take it so i will goto court and see if i can get this dismissed some how.....

High schools? NO. Christina, the only card company that's going to come to a high school is a card company that is going to solicit PARENTS...not kids. The percentage of students that would be 18 is WAY WAY too low for ANY card company I know of to waste their time trying to scrounge up the half dozen seniors who've turned 18 before graduation. College, yes. We do solicit on college campuses, and I agree with most people that it is inappropriate given the maturity level of most students. You said it right. College kids see it as a jackpot. But who is really to blame? I would agree that it is not a wise bet for credit companies to make loans to students. Most don't know how to manage their money. And why is that? Well, hmmm. PARENTS. Parents teach their kids not to smoke or drink or do drugs and they hope their kids aren't having sex and getting pregnant but they don't know to teach kids about money. And even those that try sometimes fail because, again, we are dealing with the maturity level of brand new adults who don't know squat about money. But the real question is, why blame the card company? No matter how dumb the company might be ( in the eyes of consumers) the fact remains that they don't hold a gun to anyone's head and force them to apply. Some starry eyed kid with dollar signs in their eyes and nothing to eat but 10 for $1 ramen soup decides the card (and the food and clothes and music and cool stuff) it can buy makes more sense than going without. And they cycle begins. It is ridiculous to blame a credit card for being in business to make money. Try having a little self control and quit whining about the "big, bad companies" who (supposedly) take advantage of poor, little old you. Because there is NOTHING that a card company does that cannot be read about in the Cardholder Agreement, which can be read in full BEFORE applying. Funny thing is, America as a whole is largely averse to reading and to educating itself before jumping blindly into whatever potentially disastrous situation it sees. I know I sound like a harsh b**ch here...but really...why is everyone so happy to blame the rest of the world for problems they themselves created?

I will not even pretend that credit companies, my own included, don't send pre-approved applications to minors or to dogs or crazy things like that. HOWEVER...the information we use to decide to whom we offer credit cards comes from the credit bureaus. With minors, they have a clean slate and no history....so the credit bureaus have to use public record information and other sources to figure out a person's age. They get this information from many places....birth records, property records, court records, tax records, welfare records and so forth. Many things can cause the credit bureaus to think you are older than you are...not the least of which is parents who use their kids' social security numbers on forms for things like welfare and their tax returns. So, in short, while you MAY get accidentally solicited for a card, the paper application will ABSOLUTELY have a checkbox or a place to initial where you MUST acknowledge that you are 18 or older. Any application that doesn't have this info gets thrown out (automatically declined and shredded). By phone, representatives are required to advise applicants that you must be a US Citizen of 18 years of age or older (you don't have to RESIDE in the US, but you must be a citizen) to apply. We see a lot of kids who are just a couple of months shy of 18 applying, figuring by the time they get the card, they'll be 18. It doesn't work that way. Some of them do slip through the cracks, for the reasons I have just mentioned. Now. What I see happening a lot when these "I was just a child and you victimized me!" claims go to court is that the judge says "Ok, fine. You're off the hook for everything you charged until you were 18 and on the hook for everything after." Sounds fair to me....if the person successfully proves they were a minor at the time of application and didn't "fudge" the numbers. Only time will tell whether that's the case here or not. I must say, though...I agree with a previous poster who mused that someone born in 1983 would be 23 years old this year. I find it hard to believe the account has been past due since 2000 or 2001 and is only now being brought to court. I find it harder to believe that someone would have the nerve to get into financial trouble and THEN go back and say "But I wasn't even a grown up!" Sounds like, if anything, someone intentionally deceived Discover Card and life was all roses for a while, probably even until after the "victim" (and I use the term loosely) turned 18. Now, suddenly, the ends aren't meeting and the "victim" is looking for possible loopholes. HMMMMMMMMMMMMM.

I guess we are all entitled to our opinions but the facts are the mentality of a 16 yr old minor and a 21 yr old adult are most different.... When we are 16 and often not educated about certain things like credit, and credit card companies come around college campuses or high schools and offer free things and make it sound as if they are giving away cash cards seem like hitting the lottery for students who do not yet know the true values of credit, money, getting a job and being responsible. Credit card companies target minors knowing that their parents will back them up with cash to pay their bills.... so people can be as moralistic as they want about this ... the facts are that the credit card companies are wrong....and I am just another victim....

I once got a "pre-approved" credit card for my three-year-old grandaughter. All's they needed was a signature. I was tempted to have her mark on it just to see if it would fly, but thought against it. You must have intended to defraud the card company unless you were forced at gunpoint, right? At sixteen you knew exactly what you were doing, you just thought you were immune and would get away with it. Welcome to the real world.

So you were born in 1983, so you'll be turning 23 this year (2006). How much of your balances is related to purchases that you made AFTER you turned 18? Each time you signed a credit card slip, you sign an agreement agreeing to be bound by the terms of the original credit agreement. When a minor enters into a contract, the contact is not aumotically void but VOIDABLE only if the minor or the guardian takes action within the proper time limits. You can't go back 7 years and declare a contract void. And do you know how many times I have heard people claim they weren't served with the lawsuit? Yeah right. You were served, you ignored the lawsuit and now you are paying the consequences. Grow up and take responsibility for your own actions.

It was only a default judgement, I do recall putting my birth date (1983) , So I was probably 16/17 at the time...I never recieved the summons I found out when my bank told me my account had a block and they gave me the information. I requested a copy of my original application from discover over a month ago and they are giving me the run around switching me from one dept. to another. I need this information for court hopefully I will get it in time. I do not even remember if I signed up for the card online or an actual written application. This was almost 7 years ago, I can hardly remember what I wore last week, but I am pretty sure that I would have put down all correct information.

Brett has a good point. If you lied about your age on the application, the card issuer is off the hook because it would have been YOU that engaged in a fraud against them. I suggest that you ask them for a copy of the application you signed, and post it here for us. I am quite sure that if you put your age as 16 or 17 on the application, they would have denied it and asked for a parents signature and ss#. How did your bank account get frozen, and by whom? This can only be done by a court order, and a court order can only be obtained after a judgement is issued. Did you ignore the summons when you got sued? There are many things in your post that just don't add up.

My question to you is what was the age you put on your credit card application? Credit bureaus routinely forward information to creditors without knowing the true age of the consumer. When I worked at Discover Card I spoke with a mother who's daughter had applied for a card as a minor... turned out she claimed she was 18 at the time of application. So what age did you put on your application?

I've had a Discover Card since I was 18. In five years, I've had very few problems. While I can agree that it's poor business practice for a credit card company to solicit it's services to minors, I don't think those minors who do sign up should be free of any responsibility to repay the debt. You signed up knowing the terms, and you charged on it knowing you'd be billed. Granted you were a year under age for obtaining credit, you knew that when you agreed to it. - "Laws are making it harder for people to claim bankruptcy, why don't they strengthen the laws that pertain to giving minors credit cards without parental permission at the least. Then maybe we would not have so many bankruptcies taking place" - Minors getting credit cards is not what is causing the bankruptcies. It's people being irresponsible with their money and then trying to get out of repaying their debts. That's why the laws changed and that's why we'll no longer have so many bankruptcies taking place.

You entered into a contract -- they would provide you a certain amount of credit and you would pay it back on their terms. A contract can be voidable if one of the parties was incompetent to enter into a contract at that time, and being underage is considered being incompetent. Ask Discover what law they are using to say that a 16 year old can enter into a legal contract. This happened to my daughter -- Bank of America gave her credit when she was 17, and threatened her with all kinds of misery when she didn't pay it back. It only took one letter from an attorney asking if B of A habitually entered into contracts with minors. (I paid it off for her because she did owe the money, and guess what! It ended up on MY credit report as a "write off". That took a while to straighten out. One of Murphy's Laws -- no good deed goes unpunished).