Credit card banks, though not hit as hard by the fair-lending issue as their mortgage counterparts, are beginning to face up to it.
Even in the absence of definitive statistics on the availability of card loans in poor or minority communities, bank executives acknowledge that their cardholder rolls are skewed toward people with middle and upper incomes.
Some issuers are taking steps to rectify disparities, hoping to forestall further regulatory scrutiny of one of their best and most consistent sources of profit.
Few bankers believe prejudice has been a factor in their credit card selectivity. They point particularly to the rapid growth in secured cards - those with credit lines backed by deposits - which help low-income borrowers and others establish a credit record.
But some community advocates aren't ready to let the card lenders off the hook.
"If you live in an urban community that's redlined, you're not getting a credit card," said Bishop George D. McKinney of San Diego's Church of God in Christ. "Institutional racism does not take into account credit and character."
The clergyman's words echo those hurled previously at mortgage lenders and at banks in general in the context of the Community Reinvestment Act, which requires them to maintain a presence in the areas where they gather deposits.
Bishop McKinney has personally tried to educate his predominantly minority congregation about credit cards and said he would like to bring banks into the effort, in the same way some institutions are working with community groups to promote home lending.
While the card industry has no loan-bias barometer like the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act, sketchy market research indicates that white people are at least twice as likely to have credit cards as blacks or Hispanics.
The Equal Credit Opportunity Act specifically prohibits credit card issuers from discriminating on matters such as race. A move last year to make credit cards part of the Community Reinvestment Act reviews raised their profile, and under the Clinton administration's pending CRA revision, cards could make up part of the "lending test" for heavily consumer- oriented banks, along with auto, home equity, and other categories.
But CRA enforcement continues to emphasize mortgage, community development, and small-business activity.
"I haven't seen any real change for us," said Robert M. Bouza, president of card operations for Key Federal Savings Bank in Havre de Grace, Md., a pioneering marketer of secured cards. "We have long had a number of affinity programs that benefit minorities."
Mr. Bouza said at least half of Key Federal's secured cards are held by minorities. He asserted that "many banks are looking to develop secured cards so they can say they have more loans in less fortunate areas."
Anticipating the CRA revision, Visa U.S.A. issued a report last fall, "Fair Lending for Credit Card Issuers," which said that federal regulators would soon shift their focus from mortgages.
Like homes, credit cards have come to be viewed as a necessity.
"Credit cards are more or less a commodity item," said Irving J. Levin, chief executive officer of Renaissance BankCard Services in Portland, Ore., who compared them to personal computers.
"You never knew how indispensable it was until you got one," he said. "You need credit cards to buy through catalogues, travel, etc. In many markets you can't get a checking account if you don't have credit cards."
San Francisco-based Visa made a variety of suggestions as to how to avert regulatory scrutiny, for example, by featuring more minority and female faces in advertisements.
This is a sticking point for Emily Gunter, who is working as a consultant to Orchard Bankcard Services, an affiliate of Mr. Levin's company. "The character brochures issued by credit card companies are not diversified," she said. "There's a definite lack of sensitivity.
"When you have an organization that has not been sensitive to the cultures of different groups and say to them, 'Here's the card,' without education or understanding, you're going to get in trouble."
Visa also suggested expanding marketing through media outlets that cater to minorities and ensuring that direct mail solicitations involve minority communities.
Among programs tailored for minority groups was a secured MasterCard launched in April by Orchard Savings Bank, with marketing help from Los Angeles-based Founders Bank, which several black investors started in 1991 to serve inner-city residents.
Both banks are working with Operation Hope Inc., a nonprofit investment organization formed in Los Angeles after the South-Central riots.
Norwest Corp.'s credit card unit in Des Moines will be shipping out advertisements in Spanish, starting Sept. 1, to locations in Arizona, New Mexico, and Colorado. Norwest installed automated teller machines with instructions in both Spanish and English in selected areas in 1993.
Also that year, Citicorp unveiled Spanish-language television commercials and prepared similar print ads in the Hispanic communities of San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Houston.
Market research expert Stephen Szekely, vice president of Payment Systems Inc. in Tampa, Fla., is reluctant to discuss the alleged disparity in credit cards according to income level. Most consumer research is now "color-blind." Mr. Szekely pointed out, however, that confusion sometimes results when household penetration rates are compared with the actual percentage of people holding cards.
"Given the high volume of mailings, I think issuers are looking for creditworthy people wherever," said Robert Skolnick, executive vice president for BAI Mail Monitor in Tarrytown, N.Y., which tracks direct mail campaigns. "They are less likely than they were years ago to ignore people regionally. We're seeing tremendous volumes of offerings to a substantial majority of the population on a regular basis."
Still, there is "anecdotal evidence" of discrimination that seems difficult to explain away.
One person who was interviewed for this article lives in the heart of one of the largest immigrant communities in New York City. He is white, 24 years old, a college graduate, and holds a full-time job. He has yet to receive a single "preapproved" solicitation. Many of his college friends living in suburbs report getting such offers weekly.
William Binzel, MasterCard's director of government relations, does not view this as an example of redlining.
"Assuming you're not going to do a mailing to every zip code, you must decide what locations you're going to make these drops in," he said. "Under the law, you can make decisions based on economics but not on race. The fact that a white person didn't get one" illustrates that it was race neutral.
"If that issuer had used race to decide where to mail, then that issuer would have had some significant and severe problems," Mr. Binzel said.
Critics contend it is impossible to distinguish between discrimination based on economics and that based on race.
"If you and I were having this conversation over a beer somewhere, then yes, I might admit that race has something to do with this," said one banker who asked for anonymity.
Ken McEldowney, executive director of Consumer Action, a San Francisco consumer group, said his greatest wish is for bankers to realize they "can make a profit without gouging people," regardless of income level or race.
