I figured it was time for me to build a list like this. I’ve learned a heck of a lot as a result of digging (several hours of digging, by the way) for all of this information. If I don’t impart at least one thing you didn’t know, I’ll eat my hat. Enjoy. 1. In 1946 John Biggins of the Flatbush National Bank of Brooklyn invented the first bank-issued credit card.2. The Diners Club card was issued in 1950 by Diners Club founder Frank McNamara.3. American Express issued its first charge card in 1958.4. The BankAmericard (later called Visa), issued by Bank of America, was also issued in 1958. 5. Smiley vs. Citibank, a U.S. Supreme Court case, lifts state restrictions on the fees that credit card companies can charge customers.6. Electronic banking traces its roots back to 1955. Bank of America was the first banking company to use the technology (in 1959). 7. Credit reporting can be traced back to the 1800s, when Lewis Tappan first implemented it.8. TransUnion was created in 1968 by its parent company, Union Tank Car Company. TransUnion was later acquired by the Chicago-based Marmon Group.9. Experian was created in 1980 and started off as an information service business. 10. Equifax (originally called the Retail Credit Company) was founded in 1899 and incorporated in 1913. It has been known as Equifax since 1975. 11. Fair Isaac (founded in 1956), the creator of FICO, built its first credit scoring system for American Investments in 1958. 12. The first FICO score was created for Equifax in 1989.13. Consumers were finally able to gain access to their FICO scores beginning in 2001 when Fair Isaac partnered with Equifax to roll out Score Power.14. The Discover card was created by Sears in 1985. Years later, in 1997, Morgan Stanley acquired the brand.15. Visa started out as BankAmericard. BankAmericard incorporated in 1970 as National BankAmericard Inc. In 1976, the BankAmericard name was changed to Visa. In early 2008, Visa completed the largest initial public offering in U.S. history (V: NYSE). 16. MasterCard was founded in 1966 as Interbank Card Association. Gains exclusive rights to the “Master Charge” name in 1969. By 1979, the company was renamed MasterCard. MasterCard became a publicly traded company in 2006 (MA: NYSE).17. Merchant agreements from Visa and MasterCard stipulate that retailers are not supposed to ask for photo identification as a condition to the sale. 18. Innovis is the fourth credit reporting agency. Here is the background for the CRA.19. American consumers, according to the Federal Reserve, currently (as of September 8, 2008) have $969.9 billion in revolving debt.20. American Express card numbers start with 34 and 37. Visa cards numbers begin with 4. MasterCard numbers run from 51 to 55. And Discover numbers start with 6011. These are called issuer identifiers.Look forward to additional installments of “everything you ever wanted to know about credit” in the near future.
Leave a Reply