Age Discrimination in Credit Applications Remains Unchanged
A representative of the British Banking Association (BBA), recently told broadcaster BBC that the Banking Code will remain unchanged regarding age discrimination.
A month earlier, Banking Consultant and former Bank of England executive Mike Young conducted a review of potential changes to the Banking Code and recommended that banks end the practice of age discrimination.
Contrary to what you might have been imagining, banks are rejecting older consumers’ credit applications on the morbid grounds that they may not live to pay off their debt.
Mr. Young commented that, “The guidance should be amended to ban credit rejection simply on the grounds of reaching a certain age.”
For now, however, banks maintain the rights to reject credit applications for their own reasons. As Eric Leenders, Director of Retail Banking at the BBA, explained: “The banks feel they should be able to make commercial decisions and take account of factors they might feel are relevant - and one of the factors could be age.”