Lesson Learned: Wait Longer

[rckstrscott]

Funny story today:

My and my fiance bought a house in May. I had been rebuilding my credit the past couple years, scores are doing decently.. got some cards ect ect

In an attempt to help my card portfolio for future limits ect ect, I decided I should add myself as a joint on her Macy's AmEX. I have been an AU for the past 3 years but figured a joint would help better.. not that I really know anything about credit cards..

They ran my credit when I apped and was added to the account as a joint.

Got the next statement, they dropped our limit from 3900 to a lovely 500... Mind you we keep 0 dollars on most cards.. We do use that one for yearly vacations and stuff.. so there has been a lot of activity.. call the CSR, they state because I have had recent deliquent accounts, they lowered it. My last deliquent account was 4 years ago.. ugh. So basically I should have just stayed AU haha

So the lessons is: unless you are sure things won't change, don't do it.

Funny thing is I am not really upset more as I feel like maybe I should wait a little longer before thinking I'm super credit worthy haha I am just going to garden what I have for 4 years ha

-scott

[LilNYC]

#1- congrats on your home purchase! Wish I could make the move from renter to owner.

#2- you have a much better outlook on thing than me- I would've said "lesson learned: Macy's Amex/DSNB sucks" (but they really do.) worst cc company to dispute a charge with (on the amex side) & ridiculous policies of charging you interest if you make a partial payment before your due date & then make another payment for the remainder of the balance by the due date. Insanity. I've never been added as a joint user to a cc but sounds crazy that they reduced the cl by such a drastic amount.

[rckstrscott]

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@LilNYC wrote:

#1- congrats on your home purchase! Wish I could make the move from renter to owner.

#2- you have a much better outlook on thing than me- I would've said "lesson learned: Macy's Amex/DSNB sucks" (but they really do.) worst cc company to dispute a charge with (on the amex side) & ridiculous policies of charging you interest if you make a partial payment before your due date & then make another payment for the remainder of the balance by the due date. Insanity. I've never been added as a joint user to a cc but sounds crazy that they reduced the cl by such a drastic amount.

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Thanks for the kind words about the home purchase! Essentially, thats all that mattered anyway. My overall util will go down now, and my overall score will likely drop but since I got the house, the score isn't really a concern of mine for now.

And yeah.. I talked to my fiance and I guess this is the third time they have done this to her personally... She got the card in 07, and it was $1500 limit. She used $1300 of it in the first week, and they lowered it to $1000 (so she was over the limit) -- They then increased her 6 months later to 2000, up to 4900 a year later, then down to 3900 one month after raising to $4900, again for no apparent reason. Now, all the way down to $500.

Funny thing is we had a balance until June, which I paid down to $0. We have had this card at $3000+ at least SIX times in the last 2 years, always paid down within several months. This was our vacation card, or our guilt pleasure card. So after they made XYZ off my balances and usage, they reward us by doing said limit decrease.

I don't really want such a fluky card anyway. If you are going to do limit reductions and limit increases on such whims; fine. I just won't be a customer.

-scott