Rumor: Claiming You Don't Have an SSN Gets You A Better Cellular Contract

When I, an immigrant, got my social security number, it was a huge relief. After all, work makes you free. Those of my fellows who decided to forgo such bureacratic niceties as "legal immigration," however, might retain a benefit when it comes to cell phones:

The sprint rep said there was another way he could get me the service, but that he would have to enter my information without a ss number ( in his terms, I would have to be considered an immigrant..) I said ok lets try it like that , and sure enough I was approved , with an even better credit rating

Here's my hypothesis: the systems at play assign an optimistic default credit rating to those who lack an SSN, and the lack of one prevents it from running more complex checks on their history. Interesting corollary with own life after the jump.

Get A Better Cellphone Deal By Being Immigrant? [Consumerist]

I had never driven a car before I moved to the U.S. in my mid-twenties (Londoner!), but the insurance companies seemed to treat it as if I'd been driving a decade without so much as a parking ticket.

The first car I ever owned was a sporty Toyota Celica coupe, for example: despite no driving experience whatsever, I paid less in insurance on it for on my wife's ultrasensible Nissan Sentra. It's as if the systems are made to deal only with a gamut of likely risks, and if you can get yourself out of that gamut, odd benefits accrue.