When a romance goes south, it’s not unheard of for at least one of the parties involved to begin dreaming up clever ways to continue making the other person’s life hell. And one thing you definitely don’t want to do is try to screw with your ex’s credit score.

Over at CreditCards.com, a reader with bad credit score (around 500) wrote in to ask if she could ruin her ex’s score just by adding him as an authorized account and passing through that bad credit to his world.

Short answer: Don’t do it.

First off, it probably won’t work. CreditCards.com’s Jeremy Simon writes that not all credit card companies will report anything to the authorized user’s credit report. Furthermore, only two of the three credit bureaus would consider the negative account info in their reports.

Of bigger concern: Now that your ex is an authorized user, he’s completely within his rights to request a card and go on a spending spree that you are responsible for. “After the damage is done, your ex could ask that the bank remove him as an authorized user on that account — a request most of the major credit card issuers honor immediately,” writes Simon.

Oh yeah, it’s also illegal. “If she’s adding his name and Social Security number to her card, then that would be identity theft,” says Linda Foley, founder of the Identity Theft Resource Center. “It’s a criminal act that can be considered a misdemeanor or felony, and she could possibly go to jail and end up with a criminal record for the rest of her life.”

Scheming to ruin an ex’s credit score isn’t wise [CreditCards.com]

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