When I turned 18, my parents put me as an additional card holder on their AMEX account.

My card says member since '83...even tho I was only 1 year old in '83. I inherited their good credit history.

this has already been discussed before:

Credit card issuers that report additional "Authorized User" cards on the credit reports

Adding a member with poor credit as an authorized user

there are a few other threads about adding kids as AU to their parents reports when they are less than 10 yrs old

This happened to me (my parents cards showed up on my credit history).

It actually had a bad effect on me, because when i applied for a credit card, i was denied because they said i had too much credit for an 18 year old!

My parents put me as an authorized user on their credit cards from the time i was 10 years old. My credit score is great! I have never seen "credit history too short" listed as a negative factor on my credit report.

One caveat: if the credit card listed on your report is "bad" (maxed out, late payments, etc), it will have a detrimental effect on your score. So let your parents/friends/spouses put you on their long-history credit cards, just don't tell them about maxing out credit cards with 0% offers.

I moved to the U.S. from Canada in 2002 and have had a couple of unique experiences while trying to build up my credit here.

For awhile I carried a U.S. Dollar Credit Card issued by a Canadian bank (most major Canadian banks offer at least one U.S. Dollar card product), and to my surprise it started showing up on one of my U.S. credit reports. Even though I had never given the Canadian bank my U.S. SSN and was never asked for it, they were reporting across the border to at least one U.S. credit agency in addition to the equivalent Canadian agencies. Either that, or one of the 2 Canadian credit agencies (Experian Canada and Equifax Canada) was passing the information along to it's U.S. counterpart because the card had a U.S. billing address and was being used exclusively in the U.S.

I also discovered that American Express can and will look directly at foreign American Express accounts when considering credit history. I applied for an AMEX Blue Cash shortly after I moved here and was denied outright. I had heard that they would consider foreign account history so I called them and told them I had an Canadian American Express card. They asked for the Canadian account number, put me on hold for a moment, and then came back and opened a U.S. account with a $5k credit line on the spot.

Since then I have opened a U.S. AMEX Gold card account, and my "Member Since" date is the year I opened my original Canadian American Express card, 3 years before I even moved to the U.S.

I added my brother as an additional user to my AMEX blue, which is my highest CL and second oldest CC. He is only 18 and a half and I check his credit report and score recently, it show a score of 760 for all 3 bureaus. Thus, I asked him to apply for a SonyCard for the $100 statement credit, unfortunately he wasn't approve. I guess Credit score don't mean much, instead the content of the credit report matter most.

If you need a quick bump, have someone with a higher FICO do this for you about 3-6 months ahead of schedule, give it time to start reporting, and reap the benefits, then once you qualify, and secure your loan, have them pull you from AU status, so that you get the short term benefits needed, and don't take the change that if they go south, you don't go with them.

Yes, its legal, and yes it works. I have scores in the 600-620 range. But I have someone that has 830 scores I can AU off of when the time is right, that should seriously bump me hardcore up to a better rate.

jomarrod said:My wife came from Russia a year ago. I put her name into my accounts and my car before I paid it off. Now she took my money and my car and now she's gone!

sounds like a fairy tale!

stiltner said:If you need a quick bump, have someone with a higher FICO do this for you about 3-6 months ahead of schedule, give it time to start reporting, and reap the benefits, then once you qualify, and secure your loan, have them pull you from AU status, so that you get the short term benefits needed, and don't take the change that if they go south, you don't go with them.

Yes, its legal, and yes it works. I have scores in the 600-620 range. But I have someone that has 830 scores I can AU off of when the time is right, that should seriously bump me hardcore up to a better rate.

If you are removed from someone's card as an AU, your credit score will certainly decrease. But does this remain on your credit report as a closed account? Anyone know if you retain any points just because you once had that history?
This is actually a fantastic idea especially if you are going to buy a house.

You guys are doing this and not giving them the card right