Amex Starwood Declined :( Reconsider?

[proton022]

I closed a couple of days ago. Mortgage has not yet shown up on my credit history.

Today, I first applied for Amex Starwood Preferred Guest and got declined. Then applied for Chase Sapphire on the same day and got approved. Both pulled my EX and TU. 

My mortgage lender pulled FICO a month ago was: TU: 782; EX: 747; EQ: 795. I checked EQ FICO today online, it remains at 795. Later, when I inquired Amex about their decline, they said it was because my EX score they saw was 669! 

Nothing has changed in a month other than the fact that balance on one of my cards went from 40 to 50$ on one account. Rest remained untouched. Of course, my mortgage shopping inquries  might be causing a dent in the score now. But I believe those enquiries should be accounted as 1 inquiry, so I can't understand the 78 point drop, unless the scoring methods used between credit and mortgage lenders are drastically different.

The only blemish which appears only on EX and not on the other two bureaus is a 60 day late from Sep 2010. In spite of that  EX FICO was 747 a month ago.

Anyway, I'm disappointed with Starwood reject. I called the customer service, but they just asked me to apply later. Is there anyway I can get them to reconsider? Will they do they another hard pull if I ask to be reconsidered?

Happy about Sapphire though..

[andre181]

You can recon by calling their executive office: 800-297-6197

I was declined for my Amex Blue and the people in that office called me back 2 hours later after calling and they were able to get it approved.

[LS2982]

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@andre181 wrote:

You can recon by calling their executive office: 800-297-6197

I was declined for my Amex Blue and the people in that office called me back 2 hours later after calling and they were able to get it approved.

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I agree call the executive office, they are very helpful. Fingers crossed for you!!

[proton022]

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@andre181 wrote:

You can recon by calling their executive office: 800-297-6197

I was declined for my Amex Blue and the people in that office called me back 2 hours later after calling and they were able to get it approved.

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Thanks for the info. I called this number, but the rep told me that they don't look into new applications. 

He forwarded me to the folks that handle manual review of applications. There, after some struggle, the person agreed to forward my application to the "executive review committee". Fingers crossed.

[Anonymous]

Good luck! I heard the Exec Review Committee only actually recons in like 5% of cases though. :/

Just ordered this card and the business SPG at the beginning of the month for the 60,000 starpoints! Hope you get pushed through! 

[Jazzzy]

Hi...I know this is a popular card. Can someone tell me how the points are earned....is it 1% on everything? How do you then translate them to airline miles?

I'm looking for the most airline miles I can get. Right now we use a Delta AmEx, and we like it...but it would be nice to have the option of other airlines.

Thanks for any information you can give me.

[proton022]

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@Jazzzy wrote:

Hi...I know this is a popular card. Can someone tell me how the points are earned....is it 1% on everything? How do you then translate them to airline miles?

I'm looking for the most airline miles I can get. Right now we use a Delta AmEx, and we like it...but it would be nice to have the option of other airlines.

Thanks for any information you can give me.

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Yea, you get 1 point for every dollar. You can find more information about the best ways to redeem it here: http://boardingarea.com/blogs/mommypoints/2012/08/16/maximizing-your-starwood-preferred-guest-points...

[CreditEd]

I had a similar situation in that my Experian score, pulled via the Experian homepage, was 699. But Amex stated over the phone that it was just above 653. I don't know what FICO calculation they use but they get significantly different results often.

[proton022]

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@CreditEd wrote:

I had a similar situation in that my Experian score, pulled via the Experian homepage, was 699. But Amex stated over the phone that it was just above 653. I don't know what FICO calculation they use but they get significantly different results often.

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CreditEd, The one you pull from Experian homepage is most likely a FAKO (Experian Plus model). The score I got for EX was from the lender's FICO model, so it was all the more surprising to see 70+ point difference. 

[LilNYC]

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@proton022 wrote:

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@andre181 wrote:

You can recon by calling their executive office: 800-297-6197

I was declined for my Amex Blue and the people in that office called me back 2 hours later after calling and they were able to get it approved.

---

Thanks for the info. I called this number, but the rep told me that they don't look into new applications. 

He forwarded me to the folks that handle manual review of applications. There, after some struggle, the person agreed to forward my application to the "executive review committee". Fingers crossed.

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I was initially denied for the BCP a few weeks ago & requested a recon/manual review. Took a week but was approved in the end. ( have a post about it on this forum.) I went thru the same amex channels as you- (first tried calling the exec line & was told they don't handle that (I think it depends who you speak to as others have been able to do it thru the exec office) so I called the new accts dept (likely in India) & pleaded my case to the csr who said she would send it to an underwriter for manual review.)  FYI-2 other ppl on this site posted threads about successfully reconing Amex within the past 2 weeks, so it does happen. Good luck, just don't expect to get an answer for another week & you might get another HP (at least I did.)