OH WOE IS O. For months, Stephen O has been hassledby credit card companies. It’s not because
he’s a bad credit risk. It’s simply that his last name is too short.
Twice the 23-year-old South Korean native has applied for new credit cards, and twice he’s been
turned down. The banks say their computers cannot recognise a single-letter last name.
His automobile finance company says he’s “S.O. Stephen.” The computer at the Virginia Division of
Motor Vehicles says he’s OO, which stymiedhis efforts to get car insurance for a year.
His video store once refused to honour his membership card. A lengthy computer search showed him
listed as Mr. Blank-blank O. When he tried to join a compact disc club, they wrote back three times asking
him to spell his full name.
To make matters worse, the computer at the Credit Bureau Inc., which furnishes merchants with
individual credit references, insisted that O was nobody, even though he has carried American Express and
Visa cards since he was a college student.
Instead, the credit bureau listed him as “Ostephen,” which con-fused everybody.
“I’m not a computer expert, but I can’t believe these computer systems aren’t sophisticated enough to
pick up one letter,” he said.
But O has learned that when you fight computers, the computers almost always win.
Last week, he surrendered. He paid a $20 court fee and reluctantly changed his legal name from O to
Oh