topic Re: American Express Wants Access To Bank Account Before Approval... in Credit Card Applications

American Express Wants Access To Bank Account Before Approval...

TG101 — Mon, 04 Aug 2025 18:02:03 GMT

Every time I apply for a AmEx card I get asked for access to my bank account. Never going to happen, so am I never going to get a AmEx? This seems really invasive and even if I did give them access to one, I have so many seperate accounts at different banks no single account is going to accurately represent my financial situation.

AmEx_App.png

Re: American Express Wants Access To Bank Account Before Approval...

FicoMike0 — Mon, 04 Aug 2025 18:47:59 GMT

Must be something in your credit report that they question. Maybe a data dump would get suggestions.

Re: American Express Wants Access To Bank Account Before Approval...

GZG — Mon, 04 Aug 2025 18:54:45 GMT

@TG101 wrote:
Every time I apply for a AmEx card I get asked for access to my bank account. Never going to happen, so am I never going to get a AmEx? This seems really invasive and even if I did give them access to one, I have so many seperate accounts at different banks no single account is going to accurately represent my financial situation.

this is an example of an entry in the early warning systems credit report, a report you can't freeze and you're only way to not give data to it is to find banks that don't report to it

image.png

I understand giving over your actual bank account is a tad more evasive than this, but it's really not that much more so, IMO

connecting the bank account that gets your income or has a bunch of money in it is probably what they are looking for if you decide to move forward

they may be okay with not asking you and just approving you without it at some point, but no way of telling when that will be

Re: American Express Wants Access To Bank Account Before Approval...

ADMYFIC0 — Mon, 04 Aug 2025 19:41:07 GMT

For identity verification (not income verification), AMEX prefers banks with recent transactions within a month. A high balance alone won't suffice if there's no activity in the past month – you'll be prompted to connect another bank. At least that's how it worked for me last time.

Re: American Express Wants Access To Bank Account Before Approval...

SRT4kid93 — Mon, 04 Aug 2025 20:05:56 GMT

@TG101

I bekieve they only do this when your approval is very borderline, they are unsure if they want to give you a card and use your bank account as the tie breaker. They asked for access for me, but not some of my friends and family. Since they had better profiles. And I ended up getting the borderline $1000 starting limit.

Re: American Express Wants Access To Bank Account Before Approval...

FicoMike0 — Mon, 04 Aug 2025 23:04:18 GMT

Btw, I recently apped the Aven card and they asked for a bank account to verify income. Like you, I have several accounts. I chose one with several thousand and recent activity, but to which none of my income is dded. They approved it anyway.

Re: American Express Wants Access To Bank Account Before Approval...

AndySoCal — Mon, 04 Aug 2025 23:15:05 GMT

Thanks for posting this. I will never be an AMEX customer. This is far to invasive just for an account

Re: American Express Wants Access To Bank Account Before Approval...

FlaDude — Tue, 05 Aug 2025 01:51:04 GMT

They wanted to connect to my bank for a CLI request. The only reason I was trying for the CLI was that it was my only card under 10k limit (2.5k) and pretty much for vanity reasons I wanted it over 10k too. I moved limit from another card instead to achieve my goal.

Re: American Express Wants Access To Bank Account Before Approval...

FicoMike0 — Tue, 05 Aug 2025 02:13:08 GMT

Maybe amex never asked me for a bank account because id link my amex checking.

Re: American Express Wants Access To Bank Account Before Approval...

AndrewF — Tue, 05 Aug 2025 02:26:24 GMT

When they want to see your bank account it often means your credit profile is marginal (not bad enough to trigger an automatic no, but not enough for an approval either) and they want to see if you're managing your finances and actually have plenty of money.

It can also mean that they've extended you as much credit as they're comfortable with and are starting to have reservations, but if they like what they see they might offer you more.

Re: American Express Wants Access To Bank Account Before Approval...

Jeffster1 — Tue, 05 Aug 2025 06:20:09 GMT

Amex has the right to set their standards for approval, and potential applicants have the right to either not apply, or decline the request for documentation/substantiation. Requesting financial documents to support a marginal approval is not exclusive to Amex.

Re: American Express Wants Access To Bank Account Before Approval...

SRT4kid93 — Tue, 05 Aug 2025 06:37:21 GMT

@Jeffster1

Yup, im confident if he went through with the account access he would get a $1000 limit like me unless he had a crazy amount of money in his account. Which means it's borderline just like mine was, but I had no problem giving them access.cause getting in with Amex has always been a huge goal and dream of mine and I know once your in good the sky's the limit.

But hey everyone's different

Re: American Express Wants Access To Bank Account Before Approval...

Jeffster1 — Tue, 05 Aug 2025 08:15:33 GMT

@SRT4kid93 wrote:
@Jeffster1

Yup, im confident if he went through with the account access he would get a $1000 limit like me unless he had a crazy amount of money in his account. Which means it's borderline just like mine was, but I had no problem giving them access.cause getting in with Amex has always been a huge goal and dream of mine and I know once your in good the sky's the limit.

But hey everyone's different

@SRT4kid93 Truth.

The great thing about Amex is that, once you get your foot in the door, not only do those marginal approvals grow quickly, but they are very generous with future no HP approvals for additional Amex card accounts. When I applied in 2021, they asked for income verification, which I gladly provided. They have been rewarding me ever since. And, I will admit, I did experience some frustration in trying to get my income verification uploaded and approved, but I knew that it would be worth the effort.

Is it worth the effort for everybody? No. I realize that. But I'd much rather jump through hoops initially with Amex...a company which rewards loyalty...than some other issuers who keep making you jump through hoops even after proving yourself ie.those who do not grant SP CLIs.

Re: American Express Wants Access To Bank Account Before Approval...

AndrewF — Tue, 05 Aug 2025 09:26:32 GMT

@Jeffster1 wrote:
@SRT4kid93 wrote:
@Jeffster1

Yup, im confident if he went through with the account access he would get a $1000 limit like me unless he had a crazy amount of money in his account. Which means it's borderline just like mine was, but I had no problem giving them access.cause getting in with Amex has always been a huge goal and dream of mine and I know once your in good the sky's the limit.

But hey everyone's different
@SRT4kid93 Truth.

The great thing about Amex is that, once you get your foot in the door, not only do those marginal approvals grow quickly, but they are very generous with future no HP approvals for additional Amex card accounts. When I applied in 2021, they asked for income verification, which I gladly provided. They have been rewarding me ever since. And, I will admit, I did experience some frustration in trying to get my income verification uploaded and approved, but I knew that it would be worth the effort.

Is it worth the effort for everybody? No. I realize that. But I'd much rather jump through hoops initially with Amex...a company which rewards loyalty...than some other issuers who keep making you jump through hoops even after proving yourself ie.those who do not grant SP CLIs.

AmEx gave my spouse $1,000 on a Hilton Honors even though he already had $15,000 on a BCE.

Eventually they bumped the Hilton Honors to $10,000, and gave him a Gold Card with NPSL.

Re: American Express Wants Access To Bank Account Before Approval...

Jeffster1 — Tue, 05 Aug 2025 10:05:13 GMT

@AndrewF wrote:
@Jeffster1 wrote:
@SRT4kid93 wrote:
@Jeffster1

Yup, im confident if he went through with the account access he would get a $1000 limit like me unless he had a crazy amount of money in his account. Which means it's borderline just like mine was, but I had no problem giving them access.cause getting in with Amex has always been a huge goal and dream of mine and I know once your in good the sky's the limit.

But hey everyone's different
@SRT4kid93 Truth.

The great thing about Amex is that, once you get your foot in the door, not only do those marginal approvals grow quickly, but they are very generous with future no HP approvals for additional Amex card accounts. When I applied in 2021, they asked for income verification, which I gladly provided. They have been rewarding me ever since. And, I will admit, I did experience some frustration in trying to get my income verification uploaded and approved, but I knew that it would be worth the effort.

Is it worth the effort for everybody? No. I realize that. But I'd much rather jump through hoops initially with Amex...a company which rewards loyalty...than some other issuers who keep making you jump through hoops even after proving yourself ie.those who do not grant SP CLIs.
AmEx gave my spouse $1,000 on a Hilton Honors even though he already had $15,000 on a BCE.

Eventually they bumped the Hilton Honors to $10,000, and gave him a Gold Card with NPSL.

Obviously, there was something else going on with his report when they gave him that 1K SL.

Re: American Express Wants Access To Bank Account Before Approval...

SRT4kid93 — Tue, 05 Aug 2025 14:49:02 GMT

@Jeffster1 @AndrewF

I actually spoke to Amex about that. I was talking to the executive office about something and I figured while I had them I might as well pose the question.

I said "I see all the time about people with an Amex card with a large limit, and then they apply for an additional card and they get a $1000 limit, why is that?"

they told me that every account is treated as it's own, and they do not base your starting limit off your previous relationship with them. They do this because so many people apply for a second card just for the sign up bonus and or utilization padding, and then never use the card again. So from a risk perspective it doesn't make sense for Amex to give you a 30 grand limit off the bat if you are never going to use the card again.

it doesn't matter how much money you spent on your previous card, or your previous limit. When you apply for a new Amex account you are essentially treated as a brand new customer with a brand new account. And you need to prove that you are going to consistently use the card.

I made the same mistake thinking because I spent so much money on my gold card it would automatically give me a big SL on my BCP. Nope.

I know that the most common starting limit is $1000 even for well established previous customers, and $2000 is the second most common. I realize some customers get big SL off the bat, as for how they decide who gets the big limits. it's based off your profile at the time of application And not your previous relationship.

Re: American Express Wants Access To Bank Account Before Approval...

youngandcreditwrthy — Wed, 06 Aug 2025 15:26:26 GMT

@FicoMike0 @TG101

I don't think they are questioning your report, I think they are questioning your income.

It has become commonplace unfortunately due to huge amounts of fraud (or the huge salaries the Fraud Investigators make 150K to 500K/yr) for fraud to occur. it's kind of like if you look for something, you'll find it in my view, but that said, I have been the victim of identity theft way too many times and I dont know how, but I do know how to correct it fortunately.

Furthermore, there is an income database called The Work Number which your payroll department may or may not report to. This is a place where banks will go to check your income against what you've reported. Obviously there are issues with this because they want you to report generous income usually "anything you have reasonable access to" which does include a spouse's/roommate's.. familial income in the household.

Also, many of us have varying accounts for varying purposes. less than half of my income gets deposited into my checking account, closer to a third honestly, and I'm not willing to provide access to my investment accounts, cash management accounts, or any other items like that.

I have had to prove income to Synchrony, Cap One, and BoA (even though I bank with them, they still made me send in statements???!!!)

It's just kind of useless to use one of those services like "plaid" to connect to your account to prove income because it doesn't give the whole picture - esp on your after tax/savings/401k/ emergency fund monies.

Think about the verbiage Amex had on their application and then just make sure you're in line with that. I work in Banking/Real estate and I have to convince people to use these types of software "to prevent fraud" essentially I've been trained to Gaslight heh..

but what happens when those databases leak? from Plaid or Cloudfare.. or all these other bank login sys(s)? We don't know.. yet. And in my profession our goal actually is to match the Name on the Bank Account with the Name on the Application so that there is less of a liability of someone claiming fraud and then them saying "well you let so and so pay xyz bill from so and so's account."

We live in a world where banks are dumb enough to still allow Check Kiting... I mean, come on. That's like fraud that was used a hundred years ago. I thought we had advanced?

Anyway, I'd offer Amex paper copies of the first page of three months worth of statements and leave it at that.

Its the software, for me, and the potential for data breach, leak, etc. that I don't like.

Also again.. they probably couldn't find you in The Work Number, and not every payroll department in every corporation in america reports incomes the TWN (which can be opted out of).

You could check your Lexis Nexis score too which will tank if you've been opening a bunch of accounts recently, and this report is hard to get btw and shows granular things like "how many DDA (demand deposit accounts aka checking accounts) have been opened? applied for?" How many cash advances have you taken?"

They are just looking for reason(s), and the annual credit report law(s) need to be updated to include these tertiary parties/agencies that are ever more involved in creditors' decision making processes like, SageStreamLLC, Early Warning Services, Lexis Nexis, TWN, etc.

Did you know that we even have a Prescription score now? If you take any controlled substances (or your kiddos), they score them now (0-1000 and it's called a NarxCare score). AND if their score gets too high, a Doctor can decline to refill an rx, a PharmD can decline to dispense an RX.... and so on..I've heard stories of Doctors checking this score and declining to even take on a new patient.

Re: American Express Wants Access To Bank Account Before Approval...

SRT4kid93 — Wed, 06 Aug 2025 15:57:15 GMT

Wow,

if we had the Rx scores 20 years ago we could have avoided all those patients going to 5 different doctors for opiates. Back then as long as you went to different doctors and different pharmacy to fill each rx you could essentially get unlimited pills. And people did.

another story for another day. Off topic for sure.

on topic-

the income piece is very interesting and I would be very curious to see data on the percentage of applicants who needed to connect their accounts when reporting under 100k income, vs the percentage who reported over 100k.

naturally as the income gets higher an issuer will become more and more wary and suspicious. Just because there's a lot more people that make 50,000 vs500,000

for data points

my reported income at time of application was 125,000 and I got the bank account connection requirement.

While a friend of mine reported 60,000 and did not need to connect account: I assumed it was due to strength of profile, but maybe it had more to do with her having a more common/believable income

Re: American Express Wants Access To Bank Account Before Approval...

AndrewF — Thu, 07 Aug 2025 07:19:36 GMT

@youngandcreditwrthy wrote:

Did you know that we even have a Prescription score now? If you take any controlled substances (or your kiddos), they score them now (0-1000 and it's called a NarxCare score). AND if their score gets too high, a Doctor can decline to refill an rx, a PharmD can decline to dispense an RX.... and so on..I've heard stories of Doctors checking this score and declining to even take on a new patient.

Good thing that the last time I took narcotic pain killers was after I had my wisdom teeth out, in 2000. It's not that I haven't been through a lot of painful stuff, it's that our government has spent so many years prioritizing people who WILL find drugs over people who ARE in pain, so yes, doctors are just walking away from their duties to protect their license.

I'll have to be on them next month after my shoulder surgery which involves a bone graft and some other repairs. Needless to say I am not having them cut into my shoulder down to the bone to get a bottle of pills. I hate drugs. I don't like being loopy.

The painful stuff that I didn't even get ANY pain medicine at all for includes the reason I need shoulder surgery now. In 2009 when I had no health insurance, I had two seizures on the first Sunday of September. The first one was in a walk in shower. I fractured my shoulder while I was in the seizure and when I came to, I had to crawl screaming to the living room to get help. The doctor argued "How do you even know it was a seizure." I had another one right there. They had to treat the seizure, but they found out I was uninsured, and didn't do anything about my broken shoulder or pain, and threw me out of the hospital with Aphasia, not knowing how to speak or who my mother was. They then sent a bill for $16,000.

So the whole mess going on in my shoulder has developed into degenerative arthritis and there are fragments of my humeral head floating around where the joint should be in one piece. But I have Medicare now, so I can finally get the shoulder repaired if I hurry, before the "WISeR" cuts happen in a couple years.

I don't have an addictive personality, no, never.

Anyway, regarding credit scores (I had no idea there was a pain pill score, but since American hospitals aren't much more than a debt collector, it doesn't surprise me), I had to explain to my spouse today while we were sitting at the bank how many thousands of credit scores there must be for Americans by now, as well as criminal backgrounds where nobody will hire you because of a petty misdemeanor from 40 years ago, and a complete record of if you've ever been evicted (during a rent crisis where it goes up at least $100 a month every year), but all you hear is "China bad! China baaaaaaad!"

I'm starting to take the Ellen Ripley position on the credit score issue "You know, I'm not sure who's worse, Burke, you don't see them selling each other out for a [self-censored] percentage!" (Aliens)

Turning everything into a numerical score is definitely out of the playbook of the financial industry.

There's an Experian Health thing now and the only way to block hospitals from sniffing around is to freeze your Experian credit report. It's none of their business what's on your credit report. It should be illegal for them to even look at that when you need medical attention.

I'm just dismayed at all the places all these outfits can look at all sorts of "numbers", and meanwhile there's no regulation on all these "shadow credit scores". Or if they're even fair, or accurate.

Re: American Express Wants Access To Bank Account Before Approval...

AndrewF — Thu, 07 Aug 2025 07:28:23 GMT

@SRT4kid93 wrote:
Wow,

if we had the Rx scores 20 years ago we could have avoided all those patients going to 5 different doctors for opiates. Back then as long as you went to different doctors and different pharmacy to fill each rx you could essentially get unlimited pills. And people did.

another story for another day. Off topic for sure.

on topic-

the income piece is very interesting and I would be very curious to see data on the percentage of applicants who needed to connect their accounts when reporting under 100k income, vs the percentage who reported over 100k.

naturally as the income gets higher an issuer will become more and more wary and suspicious. Just because there's a lot more people that make 50,000 vs500,000

for data points

my reported income at time of application was 125,000 and I got the bank account connection requirement.

While a friend of mine reported 60,000 and did not need to connect account: I assumed it was due to strength of profile, but maybe it had more to do with her having a more common/believable income

My mother alone has more income than me and my spouse put together, and cheaper rent. AmEx connected to her bank and saw that she had 78 cents in it. Denied.