The parent trap

Some Financially Strapped Parents Dipping Into Their Unwitting Kids’ Credit

CHICAGO (AP) – It was her first credit card application, or so she thought, prompted by an offer on her Ohio college campus for a free T-shirt.
But a rejection letter uncovered troubling news – someone had already opened four credit cards in her name and racked up $50,000 in debt.

That someone, it turns out, was her father.

“I couldn’t believe it,” says the young woman, who asked not to be named for fear of humiliating her father, who was never charged criminally.

Now 25 and living in Chicago, she says she knew her father was struggling financially after his divorce from her mother and the failure of his restaurant. But she never imagined he’d fill out credit card applications sent to his home in her name. “He completely violated my trust and my privacy and my future,” she says

I see the credit card companies are doing their due dilligence.