Discover CLI Denial Questions

[chwebb1]

Hello All,

I asked for a SP CLI on my Discover card to increase it to $2500. They denied me a request and sent me a letter. In the "Key Factors that affected your credit score" section, it included:

% of balance to credit limit too high on revolving accounts

Lack of recent installment loan information

On the % of balance to CL, my highest account is my Barclaycard Ring. The most I'll let that get to is $300/1000. I've read that Barclays likes to see 20-35% util for auto-CLI, and I'm going for that with them. All of my other accounts are well under 10%. I PIF Amex before the statement cut, and I let a $10 balance report on my Citi card. I'll also PIF Discover before statement cut. I don't use my BB&T card. Is it really grumbling that I'm using 30% on Barclays and the rest of my accounts are under 10%? Or could something else be generating that?

As far as the "Lack of recent installment loan", I've never had an installment loan. Would it be beneficial to me to look at getting one? I saw that DCU has a credit builder loan (https://www.dcu.org/loans/credit-builder.html). Should I look at getting that? I don't want to pay a higher APR than 8% no matter what I get since I have the Ring at 8%. Any thoughts on if it's necessary for me to get an installment loan?

Thanks in advance for the help.

EDIT:

According to CreditSecure, my total debt is $213, and my total limits are $13,800, leaving me with a 1% overall utilization.

[09Lexie]

I wouldn't pay too much attention to those canned reasons. Those are generic factors based on your CS. Discover is a more conservative lender and it's rare that they will meet cls based on your existing profile. They use their internal scoring to determine cls.  

I would use your card, show a good PYT history and try again

[jeffg330]

Where did you read Barclayes likes to see 20-35% for auto CLI? 

[TravellingNomad]

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@09Lexie wrote:

I wouldn't pay too much attention to those canned reasons. Those are generic factors based on your CS. Discover is a more conservative lender and it's rare that they will meet cls based on your existing profile. They use their internal scoring to determine cls.  

I would use your card, show a good PYT history and try again

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+1

i had my Discover card for over two years with a cl of $1.5K. i've had it where it was almost maxed out, carrying high balance, carrying low balance, and pif each month. then about a week ago i hit the luv button on their website to double my limit. the following day credit analyst called to ask some info and asked what i wanted the increase for. said for the balance transfer offer. then she started saying that she sees my perfect history with my Discover card. she also sounded off that she's glad to see that on all my credit cards i don't have any balance and the 2 that does have balances, i keep them low. she told me to just keep up the pattern and said she would approve me for a total cl of $5.5K.

so based on that conversation with the credit analyst, they like to see good payment record with their card.

[FinStar]

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@09Lexie wrote:

I wouldn't pay too much attention to those canned reasons. Those are generic factors based on your CS. Discover is a more conservative lender and it's rare that they will meet cls based on your existing profile. They use their internal scoring to determine cls.  

I would use your card, show a good PYT history and try again

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+1

[B335is]

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@jeffg330 wrote:

Where did you read Barclayes likes to see 20-35% for auto CLI? 

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It's lengthy, but you may want to read through this Barclays thread that contains tons of info with other myFico members experiences with Barclays:

Barclay CC Thread

In my own experience, their analysts have gone through my spending and balance patterns intricately when I've asked them to consider CLI or even recon a new card.

[chwebb1]

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@jeffg330 wrote:

Where did you read Barclayes likes to see 20-35% for auto CLI? 

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It was actually on the Ring community site. It was in a blog post that was posted by one of Barclays employees.

[CredittotheMax]

Discover is kind of weird because they don't like it when customers ask for CLI. In my experience, they will denie your request and then auto CLI in a month or two.

[chwebb1]

So you guys wouldn't look at getting an installment loan to try to make them happier?

[longtime_lurker]

I think your FICO (and clearly their internal scoring scale) is knocking your score down for not having one (10% types of credit for FICO). I don't know about DCU, but MSUFCU gives low interest rates on personal "signature loans", plus you prepay whatever you want and they just bump your due date by how ever many payments you put ahead...I know someone who took out 1,500 and the next day paid 1499 and left $1 to keep it open...but MSUFCU is SP happy, and will use previous HP's within 180 days so it was worth it for him.

IMO, I would see if DCU has

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@chwebb1 wrote:

So you guys wouldn't look at getting an installment loan to try to make them happier?

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prepayment penalties.