Are credit blacklists real?

Many people with bad credit worry that they’ll be placed on a credit blacklist – particularly if they’ve missed a lot of payments or have received court orders or County Court Judgements (CCJs). The question, though, is – is the credit blacklist a real thing?

Are credit blacklists real?

For those who are worried they might be on a credit blacklist, the answer to this will provide some relief.

No – there’s no such thing as a credit blacklist. There’s also no such thing as a list of high-risk borrowers that lenders and credit agencies can access and use to decide to refuse people credit.

The only thing a lender will use when trying to determine whether they’ll lend to you, is your own credit report, which is based on your own credit history… and nothing else.

If your credit history includes things like missed payments, CCJs or past bankruptcy filings, then lenders might look unfavourably on these and reject you based on them. It won’t, however, be because you’re on a credit blacklist, remember – there’s no such thing.

Can a house or address be blacklisted?

Again, this is a no.

Regardless of the credit history of any previous owners or tenants at an address, the address itself won’t be linked to you, or the house you now live in because of the debts of previous inhabitants.

In short, your credit rating is based on you, not your address.

Will the bad credit rating of someone I live with affect my credit rating too?

Regardless of your relationship with anybody you live with, be it a partner, member of your family or a friend or housemate, their money issues won’t have any effect on you unless you’re ‘financially associated’ with them.

A ‘financial association’ is a link that’s created, between you and somebody else, when you take out a financial product together – for example, a joint account, a joint loan application or a mortgage.

You don’t have to have an existing joint agreement to still be financially associated with someone, closed joint agreements can remain on your credit report and so can applications you made that you chose not to go ahead with, or were refused.

Although having a financial association with someone that has bad credit won’t actually affect your credit rating (remember, your credit rating is based solely on your own credit history), it could lead to lenders looking less favourably at any credit applications that you make.

Why?

Because they may take a financial association’s past behaviour into account – even if you’re no longer ‘with’ them and are now applying for credit on your own.

You can contact credit reference agencies and ask them to remove old financial associations from your credit file.

Can credit reference agencies (CRAs) control lenders’ decisions?

CRAs can’t tell a lender whether or not to lend you money. Only a lender can decide whether they’ll offer you credit or not.

Lenders will, however, make a decision that is often based on many different factors within your credit file.

That said, all lenders have a different set of criteria that they use when deciding whether to offer credit to somebody. Some lenders and their criteria are stricter than others are.

If a lender is less concerned about poor credit history and CCJs on your credit report, though, they will usually provide credit at a higher interest rate than you’d get offered if you had a better credit rating.

If you’re worried about debts and your ability to repay them, although you won’t be on a ‘credit blacklist’, it could be worth you exploring how a debt solution might help you to reduce your monthly repayments and stop your creditors from contacting you.

If this sounds like something that might benefit you, simply click here to fill in our online form and one of our advisers will give you a call to discuss your options. It only takes 30 seconds to fill the form in and getting your finances back in order and beginning the process of repairing your credit rating could be the best decision you make all year.