Apple seriously misjudged the risk to its brand by getting into the credit business. When you tell someone they're not eligible for credit, you're literally telling them they're "not worthy". That's going to suck in all cases, but when they're then also wrong, hell's fury comes.
The assessment of creditworthiness is intrinsically linked with a judgement of character and worth. Can we trust you to repay this money? No surprise people are pissed when a capricious algorithm says NO on behalf of Apple. Apple owns this.
This is what's so disappointing here. Apple is in a unique position of power to actually clean up this dirty business. To make access to credit a fair, transparent, and accountable process. Along with its commitment to privacy, this could be a killer combo! But V1 blew it.
They delegated the most central question of the entire product – CAN I USE THIS? – to a status-quo player with a checkered moral past. That's just a bad deal. And the consequences of that errant thinking are coming due now.
