Accessing Canadian Credit Reports for US Credit

Hi there,

I am an American who has been in Canada since 1983. Finally, after several years of planning, my family and I are moving to Charlotte, North Carolina. (Reba, I will bring you Shreddies, if you contact me B4 we leave!)

Any suggestions on getting credit? More specifically, does anyone know of any CC companies that will access our Canadian credit history a a basis for extending credit?

I spent 2 years in Buffalo - back and forth to Toronto - while processing my husband's green card. I worked for myself during that time and the bank I used for savings would not give me a card with even $500 of credit!?!?

Thanks.

Two basic ways to get it simply, the first is get an Amex card and get it transferred to the US. The second method is to get a secured credit card, i.e. they give you a credit limit up to whatever you have in your chequing account. Most of the big commercial banks offer secured accounts, e.g. Bank Of America

Eventually they trust you with a regular card.

Another method which I've been looking into myself is to use a US bank controlled by a Canadian bank, e.g. Harris Bank which is controlled by BMO. Or RBC, which has US operations.

The only problem using a Canadian bank is that they don't appear to be as competitive with rates and so on as the US banks.

We used Bank of America when we first moved to the US last October. Had no US credit history and they agreed to give a $5000 credit line based on our Canadian credit file. Don't try this in branch, phone the 1800 number and ask to speak to someone in the credit department. The regular customer service won't help you. It took us a few phone calls before we got through to the right department.

Also if you have a Canadian issued AMEX, I'm told that you can call them and get it changed to a US one.

Just be aware that credit is getting very tight and banks are being very stingy with who they issue credit to, so you could run into problems that didn't exist when we moved last fall.

Good luck

Thank you everyone!

Second the comment on Bank of America, customer service gave me duff info yesterday.