<prompt> Human: 20 year old with good but minimal credit history here. Before I opened my first credit card around 9 months ago and started to learn about credit, I had two hard inquiries made. These inquiries were floated to me almost as a lets see if you get approved type of deal.Once was at Verizon when I was trying to open a new account and the other time was at Bloomingdales when the saleswoman didnt adequately explain that she was running an application for the store credit card which I obviously was not qualified for at the time. I was also offered credit cards at my bank. At this point I was already using credit and understood that this would be a hard inquiry, so I declined. I also had no interest in the cards they were offering. I can think of several other examples of having to deflect hard inquiries. My question is this: with the exception of credit card companies themselves wanting to open new accounts, why do businesses sometimes seem like they are dying to run a hard inquiry and seemingly try to skirt around the fact that this will 1 actually be a hard inquiry and 2 a hit to credit. Im curious if anyone can enlighten me here. Thanks.  <response>: why do businesses sometimes seem like they are dying to run a hard inquiry and seemingly try to skirt around the fact that this will 1 actually be a hard inquiry and 2 a hit to credit.Because they are trying to sell you a product credit. 