Consumer complaint received 2018-09-19
Product: Credit card or prepaid card — General-purpose credit card or charge card
Issue: Getting a credit card — Application denied
Company: KEYCORP (NY)

To whom it may concern, I am filing a complaint against KeyBank which discriminated against my nationality during a credit card application. I visited KeyBank on XX/XX/2018 at a local KeyBank branch on XXXX XXXX in XXXX NY and a banker opened a checking account for me and also submitted my credit card application. The only information shared with me about the credit card application at that time was that a credit history check will be done and the credit card will arrive in 5-7 days. On XX/XX/XXXX, I received a letter in the mail from KayBank demanding additional document : a copy of permanent resident card, and an explanation of address discrepancy. The letter also states, " If we do not receive this information by XX/XX/2018, we will regrettably be unable to give further consideration to your request and any pending title and appraisal orders will be cancelled ''. On XX/XX/XXXX, I called both KayBank customer service and the local branch, and asked what should I do if I am legally working in the US but do not have a permanent resident card and what other documents can I provide instead. The answer given to me by both the customer service and local branch banker was, " if you do not have a permanent resident card, we can not issue the credit card. '' I asked the banker why he did not bring this up during the credit card application. And he said he just assumed I had the permanent resident card. Frankly if he would have told me about this policy of theirs, I would not have applied for KeyBank credit card and I would have canceled my KeyBank checking account immediately because I prefer not to work with a bank that discriminates against my nationality. I have lived in the US legally for 11 years and have had many credit cards from major US banks, such as XXXX, XXXX, XXXX XXXX, XXXX, but never had I been discriminated because of my nationality and never had I been rejected due to not having a permanent resident card. I asked for clarification but the answer KeyBank gave me again was - it was the KeyBank policy and you would have to have a permanent resident card to be issued a credit card. While this is offensive, it is also against the law. The federal law, Equal Credit Opportunity Act, clearly prohibits discrimination in any part of most credit transactions, including applications for credit, credit evaluations, restriction in granting credit, credit terms, and etc. The ECOA law also deems it unlawful for any creditor to discriminate against any applicant with respect to any aspect of a credit transaction because of race, color, national origin, sex, and etc. The KeyBank policy that only permanent resident card holders or US citizens can be granted KeyBank credit cards clearly violates this law. Second, they were not transparent about the conditions for credit card application and all documents required. Thirdly, the way KeyBank handled customer relation after this problem came up was simply saying to me that this is KeyBank policy there is nothing they can do. Putting these all together makes me wonder what makes KeyBank and its employees think it is okay to discriminate in such a blatant way. As a customer, I would like to speak up and hope CFPB could help make this right. Thank you!