I applied through college or university. The process took 3 days. I interviewed at Capital One (Ithaca, NY) in Oct 2013
Interview
I was contacted through my university's career services and told to submit an application. I applied online through my career services center and the Capital One online application. Within a couple days, the recruiter for my university contacted me via e-mail and told me that I should set up an interview time. He also attached some information about what the interview would be like, including a YouTube video about Capital One case study questions. The weekend before the interview the recruiter contacted me and asked if I had any questions that I would like cleared up. He also invited me to a networking/information session that would explain what to expect from the interview, the analyst position, and Capital One as a whole.
The interview consisted of one question that involved a break-even analysis with respect to the credit card business Capital One conducts. It involved two types of credit card users. I forget the names of the types, but one used the credit card and only paid the interest while the other user would buy a lot with the card and then pay it off at the end of the month. The first calculation was relatively straightforward, but the second calculation was slightly more complex involving two unknowns and a basic integral/average value. The final part of the interview was then asking me some more conceptual questions about what this analysis meant for the company and which type of credit card user would be most recession proof. The interview was conducted by a current analyst at the company. From this there is another round of interviews in their headquarters in Virginia. I was not given on offer to attend this event.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
The most difficult question that tripped me up was the break-even calculation made with respect to the credit card user that pays off the whole balance at the end of every month. I don't remember the specific calculation, but I do remember that I had to relate the average value on the card every month to an integral of a line from the origin, basically the area of a triangle.
3 rounds of interviews, technical round focused on domain of expertise. Then there was a case study round. Interviewer was interested in execution of clear thoughts on data along with written codes.
I was referred so first a game like assessment that tested basically middle school algebra skills. Then a business case power day with three different interviewers, two of them were analytical and one was product
R1 was VJT, which was fairly simple. R2 was a screening case study, and lastly a Powerday. Powerday was grueling and cases were math heavy (bank related as well). Would recommend the process.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
They gave a product and asked for multiple ways to improve it.