Yeah I'm a little confused by their selection process, too. They don't seem to like people with a short AAoA, but they routinely approve folks with no credit.
As much as I eat out I need one of these cards, but they don't want my business.
Decisions are often based on computer algorithms which take into account more than just your credit score.
I imagine they are considering things your not even aware of, a high score is nice but it's only a piece of the puzzle.
I am not a credit guru but I do know algorithms and I can tell you this, fico scores alone do not make the decision.. I think people misunderstand that a lot!
This all makes perfect sense I could keep my fico score high by keeping my utilization down on my cards and hardly ever using them (buy a pack of gum) however it doesn't demonstrate to the company my ability to pay more than the minimum payment each month and I highly doubt it will result in a significant CLI or them granting me another card with a significant CL although it may help in obtaining a card from another company.
This is just one example, there are a lot of things that could be taken into consideration no one here can say they know how all of this works or that all companies work the same and just because someone knows a little about fico it doesn't mean they know anything about the company's approval process.
For all we know they "could" be factoring in an area's unemployment rate, this really wouldn't be unrealistic.
I agree though that the "Too many new accounts (4 in the last year)" might have been why 