Consumer complaint received 2023-09-19
Company: DISCOVER BANK
State: AZ
Product: Payday loan, title loan, personal loan, or advance loan
Sub-product: Installment loan
Issue: Getting the loan

Complaint:
I applied for a Discover XXXX XXXX on approximately XX/XX/2023. I proceeded to fill out their on-line application. It presented the term length and interest rates that were available to me based on my initial application and I am assuming the soft check of my credit, and made my choice. After that, I received an email response indicating that they were interested as well and to continue with my application process. I continued the application process at which time Discover proceeded to request that I send in pictures of my social security card, front and back of my drivers license, provide them 3 months of statements of a primary bank account ( which I took as the one where they would see paycheck deposits and mortgage payments ) and to also provide them the account number and routing number of where they would be depositing the loan funds. I proceeded to provide all that information. They did a hard credit check with XXXX where my XXXX XXXX was XXXX and also did a pull from XXXX. My bank cash balances exceed the loan amount by XXXX, my debt-to-income ratio is less than XXXX percent ( 0.12 % ), my other assets exceeded the loan amount by over XXXX and I have minimal debt. They said that everything checked out but that they were denying the loan request due to not being able to validate the phone number I put on the application ( A cell phone number that has been assigned to me for over 20 years ). This initial rejection took place on XX/XX/XXXX. I proceeded to verify there were no blocks on caller id presented to them when I called in and verified that both credit reporting agencies had my cell number registered, as did the bank on the statements that they requested. At no time did Discover try and call me directly, but they had no issues validating me for security reasons each time I called in to them. Even after verifying with them that the phone number I provided was listed with the credit agencies they used and matched the number from which I was calling, they still refused to provide the loan. This final resolution by them took place on XX/XX/XXXX. The fact that they requested account and routing numbers prior to approving the loan is questionable in my opinion as they would not need that info unless they were planning on approving the loan. Also, collecting an image of driver 's license rather than just my driver 's license info seems to serve no other purpose other than collecting an image of my face, including gender and XXXX XXXX. The fact that they denied the loan only based on not validating a phone number that was valid and on the credit reports they pulled borders on an untruth. At the minimum, the process seems to be no more than an exercise for Discover to collect personal information from me and at worst case, is showing unfair lending practices possibly based on gender, XXXX XXXX and/or income and debt levels that don't play into the types of customers that are more likely to make late payments and allow them to charge more.

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation