Here is another dealer thread. This is something that has been bothering me. I've recently purchased two vehicles and paid cash for them. In both cases, the dealer pulled my credit, even though I said from the beginning I'm paying cash. I know why, as they tried like heck to get me to finance in the F&I office due to my credit rating. Yes, financing was cheap, but I wanted to pay cash, as I only have one very small payment now. My issue is this.....Each credit inquiry dings your FICO score, especially when there is no corresponding account. The automatic assumption is that you didn't get approved, which in my case is not true. I simply wanted to write a check.

On the second vehicle, my specific instructions were NOT to pull my credit, but they claimed they had to for AML purposes. BS. I work in financial services and we don't pull credit, we just get the info. and verify indentities using other methods.

Anyone else faced this issue?

 

When I talked to my guy at Chase they told me when dealers pull your credit like that its only a temporary bump on your score. He said it should be gone though in a month or less.

But he said it would be a different story if you had 9 dealerships pull them and then try applying for a couple credit cards as well... but just 1 or 2 dealerships and maybe a bank wouldn't be a real effect on your score.

 

I bought a motorcycle from a dealer, and I paid them cash and they didn't do a credit check. Neither did they do a credit check on my friend who bought a brand new bike.

Seems rather fishy.

 

I paid cash for my current truck and I didn't even give them my SSN.

If you knew you were paying cash and didn't want them running your SSN, you shouldn't have even given it to the dealer in the first place.

 

They should get your SSN, for identification purposes. Running a ident. check through Experian does not show as an inquiry on your credit report. You have two scores, a Fraud Score and a FICO Score. The Fraud Score measure how well the identification information you provided matches that on the report.

 

I guess I really don't see how this is that big of a deal.

Do you monitor your FICO score through a website like myFico.com? If so, you can see how small actions like this affect your score. I am sure those pulls are pretty insignificant in the grand scheme of things.

Just let it go, life's too short to sweat the small stuff.

 

They can't pull your credit unless you let them. If you are paying cash do not sign the consent.

 

I didn't.