To clarify something, there are other NPSL cards out there, not just Amex charge cards.
Under FICO '04 and foward, anything with a term of 1-month is excluded from the revolving utilization calculation; the '98 and '95 models which are still being sold albeit rarely to my knowledge, do calculate it as a standard revolving tradeilne. This applies to Amex charge cards which do report as that. and what the Amex representative said was absolutely right with regards to their specific cards.
That said, there are credit cards which do not report as a term of 1-month, are NPSL (some Visa Sig, BOFA used to do this routinely and might still on some cards) and don't report an express limit; in that scenario, what FICO stated was correct: namely, your high balance reported for the tradeline is used as your limit for calculation purposes.
Both Amex and FICO are correct, and they did not contradict each other from the sounds of it, they were simply talking about somewhat different things.
The big bugaboos with the NPSL cards is that if you set a new high reported balance, you effectively are hit with the maxxed tradeline penalty. To combat this the typical strategy is to max the card anyway, get that high balance reporting, and then go on with life... actually this was an old technique when the vast majority of cards (early 90's) didn't report an express credit limit, so the first thing you did when getting a new card was run your life through it to max it while pooling cash, then pay it off.
Sadly allegedly high balance can be reset after some period which I've heard is 12 months, but I haven't been checking my credit reports closely for the last year so not certain if that holds now and irritatingly the EQ pull I had in January doesn't show high balance for the majority of my tradelines, only 2 of them, though it does list the USAA secured installment loan I have correctly with an initial / high balance of $2500 which was opened back in 1/12, so that information might be lender specific.
@Em1991 wrote:
So for me the charge card I got approved for is the American Express Aeroplan Gold Card and for this what American Express had told me would be correct? It will be ignored for utilization calculations so I can spend whatever I like on it and pay it off at the end of the month? No need for me to go out and max my card out right when I get it right? Just want to make sure.
That is correct for the vast majority (if not the outright entirety) of lender pulls currently, with the one possible major exception on a EX tri-merge pull for a mortgage. I am 99% confident that none of the lenders I routinely do anything through are still on a '98 pull: Amex, Chase, BOFA, DCU have all moved on to my knowledge at least from people's reported scores.
That's certainly the behavior I've used with my own charge card and no lender has ever troubled me over it.