[nandemo]

I think the problem you ran into wasn't so much a user interface problem, but a "gaijin aren't our target clientele" thing. 10 years ago a lot of Japanese banks regarded "gaijin without permanent residence" as riskier than a 20-year-old Japanese student; this included gaijin with good credit records and income above average. Things have been changing, though.

[autoreverse]

I think it better to paraphrase Hanlon "Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by lack of imagination." or something similar.

1) I suspect Chinese(!) names would have been validated.

2) I successfully applied for the same card via paper form 18 months later with guidance by a sales rep.

[vidarh]

As a Norwegian in the UK without any problematic things about my name, I think you don't need to assume malice or lack of imagination, simply that they did not want to handle anything but the braindead "safe" situations online.

I similarly often prefer to apply offline or in person about things, because despite more than a decade here, and great credit history, I occasionally get hit by UK banks assuming that not being on the electoral roll means increased risks (it can mean you're trying to keep your real address out of official registers). They have no problems dealing with me in person, when someone manually reviews the situation, but either they've decided it's not worth the hassle to try to deal with this online, or that it's safer to just point me to a branch or call for extra verification.

[nandemo]

Fair enough, but I'm not exactly assuming "malice", I'm just saying that such "lack of imagination" wouldn't happen if foreigners were considered an important target for the banks.