Social Security # fun
 

Back a couple weeks ago I applied for a new credit card. When I returned from my vacation (yes I was gone last week--didja notice? ;) ) I had a letter from them saying they were rejecting me because they couldn't verify the information on my application. Since I've got excellent credit, I didn't figure they'd be turning me down for anything but a paperwork screwup, so I called them up to see what the issue was. I talked to a woman who sounded like she could barely be bothered to help me, and she told me that when they ran my social security number a different name came back. She said if I could get a letter from the Social Security Administration and a current pay stub they'd look at it again.

Needless to say this didn't thrill me. I was thinking about what I ought to do to deal with this and it occured to me I should try to find out where they got this information from (one of the credit bureaus? Which one?). So I called them back and spoke to a different woman. She was not so rude and before I could even explain why I had called she started asking me some stuff to verify things, and had some brief trouble confirming the name of my employer. (Among other issues, there's another institution with a similar name in a different area code.) At this point she said OK we have what we need, we had to straighten out the business with your employer--we'll get back to you. So I told her what the first woman said, and she said no, there was no problem with my SSN everything was just fine.

OK, so now I have to figure out whether there's really a problem here with somebody else's name attached to my SSN? Which call center employee do I believe? Any advice for tracking this down definitively?

Alternative theory: somebody keyed your social wrong.

Yeah, a typo is the most obvious explanation.... but I applied online, so you'd think there'd be no re-keying of what I put in, and they appeared to have the correct one.

Have you used your free credit checks?

I had used 2 of the three... I used the third this morning, and it looked squeaky clean, nothing new and nothing that wasn't correct. I also should have another free one coming since the credit card company denied me.

I'm tempted to sign up for one of the credit monitoring programs, even though the thought of giving these leeches money for the privilege of looking at information they collected about my financial dealings and that they already make money off selling to other companies makes me vomit.

Did you get your annual statement from SS this spring? :question:

One of the major credit bureaus has my date of birth listed incorrectly, despite documentation I have sent to correct this. These are the people who are supposed to know everything about us, but they don't even have my basic information right. How do they even know who "I" am - if not a person with, at a bare minimum, my name and date of birth?

Often your SSN will be stolen not to rack up credit in your name, but just so that an illegal immigrant can get a job with it. If they had your employer wrong this sounds like a likely scenario to me.

Hmmmm interested point Clod. Bruce, I have no idea... I admit I don't pay that much attention to them. I'm thinking I got it but it could easily have been last year's, and if I didn't get it I wouldn't have noticed. Hmmm.

I recommend taking a look around ssa.gov.

if there is a chance that someone is using your social for taxes - find out now! you won't claim that income on your taxes and you will eventually be audited. they will find you weren't responsible for that income and you'll breathe a sigh of relief. then they will find some unknown and unintentional tax slip up on your point, then the laughing will begin... when you hear the laughing it is very important that you speak up and explain your preference for vaseline in the next step of your audit...