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Whenever you or anyone else asks for a copy of your credit report, the request
is supposed to be noted as part of your credit history. If you apply for lots
of credit cards in a short time, this will produce a flurry of "inquiry" notes
on your credit report. Lenders often turn this around and assume that a flurry
of inquiries means you've recently applied for lots of credit, so they turn you
down on that basis even though the inference is not strictly valid. If
a lender cites "excessive inquiries" as a reason for turning you down, this is
what has happened. The lender has guidelines for how many inquiries in what period
of time is too many. Unfortunately, you have no legal right to challenge this
policy or even to know what the specific criteria may be. Don't give your
name or address to a merchant until you're actually ready to apply for credit
there. Some merchants illegally run credit checks on you as soon as they have
your name and address, even though you have not applied for credit, to give them
an idea of what to sell you and how. (I'm told many car dealers do this.) I
don't know what legal recourse, if any, you have against unauthorized inquiries.
If lender A sees inquiries from B, C, and D but no new accounts, A may
assume that B, C, and D turned you down for credit. Figuring "better safe than
sorry," A may then turn you down just because it assumes B, C, and D turned you
down. Again, this is a judgment call on the part of A, and you have no legal right
to challenge it. If you have not applied for any credit recently but have been,
say, looking at cars at several dealerships, you might want to let the lender
know this in case it's taking unauthorized inquiries into account. | 
