Hard Inquiry Required

• A hard inquiry, by definition, is when a company checks your credit report in response to your application for credit. The other type of inquiry is a soft inquiry, which is not generated in response to a credit application. Therefore, when a credit card company checks your credit report after you apply for a new card, you will end up with a hard inquiry on your credit report. Credit card companies do not extend offers of credit without checking your credit report.
  
  

Reason

• When a credit card company issues you a credit card, it allows you to borrow money, so the company has a lot to lose if you do not repay the money. If your credit report shows, for example, that you haven't made an on-time credit card payment in years or that you just filed bankruptcy, the company probably does not want to issue you a credit card. This is because your past credit history is often a good indicator of how you will handle credit in the future.
  
  

Effects

• One hard inquiry will not have a particularly strong effect on your credit score. A hard inquiry lowers the average person's credit score by five points or less on a scale that ranges from 300 to 850, according to FICO. However, if you have very few accounts on your credit report or have not been managing credit for very long, an inquiry could lower your score by more than five points. In addition, if you have more than one recent inquiry, this will also increase the effect on your score.
  
  

Alternative

• The only way to have a credit card issued with your name on it without triggering a hard inquiry is to have someone add you as an authorized user on his account. Because you are not the account owner and have no legal responsibility to pay the bills, the credit card company does not need to check your credit before adding you. However, the account owner can remove your authorized user status at any time, so you should not rely on an authorized user card as your only source of credit.