Veronica wrote to me through the GetOutOfDebt.org site and asked the following question. If you have a credit or debt question you’d like to ask just use the online form. I’m happy to help you totally for free.
Income from the GetOutOfDebt.org site advertising is used to help alleviate poverty. If you would like to help me to help others, there are easy and free things you can do, click here to learn how you can help.
“Dear Steve,
My son was stationed in Iraq a few years ago, and I had power of attorney. I took out a credit card in his name, with the intentions of establishing credit for him when he got out. Due to unforeseen circumstances, the debt remains unpaid, and my son is stuck with the bill. All I want is to have this debt transferred to my name, and off his credit. Please tell me there is a way to do this.
Can a credit card debt be transferred to someone else?
Veronica”
The Answer:
Dear Veronica,
Veronica, Veronica, Veronica. Why?
I understand your intentions here but I assume that since you want to get the debt off his card, you used it to make purchases for yourself that you can’t pay for.
I am afraid that the only way out of this is to pay the debt in full or to apply for a new credit card or use a credit card in your name and do a balance transfer.
There is no way the bank will remove his name from the account. He was approved as the qualified account holder so the bank is not going to let him go once approved.
The only other ways to neutralize this debt is either your son makes payment arrangements, which you pay, he could go bankrupt or he could claim he had no knowledge of you taking out this card in his name and file criminal charges against you for identity theft.
As well intentioned as your game plan was, it was a horrible idea and a great burden to place on your son. Not to mention the trashing it gave his credit.
I suspect that there is a slight opportunity here that you could not qualify for a card yourself and applied for one in his name and used it to make purchases you could not afford to repay. Otherwise, if you were helping him, why wouldn’t any charges on the card be his or be yours that you paid off in the month that were charged.
I always say that there is no sense wasting a perfectly good mistake. Learn from it. The best outcome from this situation is that you follow one of my suggestions above and never ever do this again.
