29 November 2006
A mother has told of her anger at a credit card company who offered her daughter a Mastercard that would entitle her to a credit limit of £1,600 at a variable APR rate of 33.9%.
Primary school pupil Charlie Hannah rarely receives any mail at all other than at birthdays and Christmas and was mystified when she opened the brightly coloured envelope to find she had been offered a credit card from Aqua.
Charlie's mum told local paper the Globe: "We couldn't believe it when Charlie opened the letter. Fancy sending something like that to a seven-year-old girl? Imagine if she was a teenager and actually thought about completing the form and sending it off?"
Mrs Hannah was also at a loss as to how the credit card firm had got her daughter's contact details. "I also want to know how Aqua got hold of Charlie's details," she said. "I find it very worrying that these firms can use the personal details of a schoolgirl to send out this sort of material."
Aqua, a trademark of SUV Credit, operating under Halifax's licence, has since issued a statement of apology through the Globe.
A spokesman for the firm said: "Aqua deeply regrets sending a direct mail offer to Charlie. We have procedures intended to prevent this and they are being reviewed to ensure this does not happen again.
"Please be assured that had someone under 18 attempted to apply for a card they would have been automatically declined," he added before asserting that her details had been obtained through third party mailing lists, a system that is commonplace in the industry.
"We are very sorry about the mistake and we will be calling Mrs Hannah to apologise," he concluded.
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