topic Re: BOA Closed my Account in Credit Cards

BOA Closed my Account

KeithW — Fri, 11 Jun 2021 13:29:32 GMT

I have had a BOA CC for about 8 years. When I got it my score was in the mid 600s and I had to answer some questions and got manual approval. I have never had a late payment and have always paid more than the minimum balance. A few months ago my score jumped up to the low 700s after paying down my cards balances. I then put a $7k charge on my BOA card and have been paying it down with at a rate of $500 a week. This morning I get a letter saying my account is being closed.

My score has gone up, I am low risk and they made money of my account. Why close it?

Re: BOA Closed my Account

hawkins — Fri, 11 Jun 2021 13:51:36 GMT

You can call and ask them but I'm guessing they got freaked out by the large charge you just put on it. When you don't pay off a card for months or years except slowly then put a large charge on it without informing them you are going to do that they don't like that. Especially BOA. Large charges like that should go on a credit union card as they are so much more forgiving but perhaps if you called them and also paid a large portion off they might reopen I don't know.

Re: BOA Closed my Account

Anonymous — Fri, 11 Jun 2021 14:40:12 GMT

@KeithW wrote:
I have had a BOA CC for about 8 years. When I got it my score was in the mid 600s and I had to answer some questions and got manual approval. I have never had a late payment and have always paid more than the minimum balance. A few months ago my score jumped up to the low 700s after paying down my cards balances. I then put a $7k charge on my BOA card and have been paying it down with at a rate of $500 a week. This morning I get a letter saying my account is being closed.

My score has gone up, I am low risk and they made money of my account. Why close it?

Sorry to hear about the closure of your BofA account. What was the credit limit for the account?

A brief glance at your posting history suggests that you've had an elevated level of credit utilization for several years. Its quite likely that BofA reviewed your account and credit history and determined that you account does not meet their current risk standards.

Re: BOA Closed my Account

Loquat — Fri, 11 Jun 2021 14:01:18 GMT

Sucks OP as it seems like you were starting to get things under control. As has been mentioned it was probably the large charge that was unusual for your account that got the unwanted attention.

At that point it was probably just their risk assessment that lead to the closure. Again, I won't make light of it because any unexpected closure sucks. Keep doing what you're doing and if you can, BT the balance from the BoA now that it's closed.

Don't get discouraged as most of us around these here parts have experienced such in our journey.

Re: BOA Closed my Account

brk1971 — Fri, 11 Jun 2021 16:09:42 GMT

@KeithW wrote:
I have had a BOA CC for about 8 years. When I got it my score was in the mid 600s and I had to answer some questions and got manual approval. I have never had a late payment and have always paid more than the minimum balance. A few months ago my score jumped up to the low 700s after paying down my cards balances. I then put a $7k charge on my BOA card and have been paying it down with at a rate of $500 a week. This morning I get a letter saying my account is being closed.

My score has gone up, I am low risk and they made money of my account. Why close it?

It's not my intent for this to sting, but rather to provide some objectivity in the analysis... Playing a bit of banker's advocate here....

A few months ago, your scores were improving when you paid down several balances, but at that time, you posted an effectively maxed BoA card balance (right at 80%ish of a $7k credit line). After some significant improvement in your scores (based on paying indebtedness...), you took an action to charge a significant amount of your credit line with them back up. Not sure if your BoA CL has increased since then, but if it's still at $7k and you just re-maxed it, that's a HUGE red flag to the bank. The fact that you're paying $2k a month toward that charge is notable (but not reflected in the history yet, because it's current and future tense, not past tense). When you zoom out to data points only, your pattern over the past year or so could easily look (to the bank / banks algorithym) like... "Debt not well managed.............Improvement noted............Risky behavior noted."

Now, I'm not saying that's the case, there may be a multitude of factors involved. But with only the information you've posted about here on MyFico, I don't find the bank's actions here remarkable. (Please understand I am not saying you're not improving or that you made or make bad decisions, heck, I'm not even evaluating your decisions. I'm only trying to explain it from the bank's side of things... They certainly have knowledge of your internal and external balances / utilization rates.)

Re: BOA Closed my Account

KeithW — Sat, 12 Jun 2021 15:13:45 GMT

I had been carrying a $2500 balance on the card for a while and it has a $7k limit. I paid it off then changed $6500 to it and a month later, now, it is down to $5000. I have 22 cards and have paid off all but 4 now.

Re: BOA Closed my Account

Loquat — Sat, 12 Jun 2021 15:22:36 GMT

@KeithW wrote:
I had been carrying a $2500 balance on the card for a while and it has a $7k limit. I paid it off then changed $6500 to it and a month later, now, it is down to $5000. I have 22 cards and have paid off all but 4 now.

@KeithW Congrats on the success. Keep doing what you're doing and hopefully the other 4 will be paid off soon. Now that you've mentioned that you carried a balance for a while and then after paying off it off you ran it back to within $500 of your limit is what set off the bells. Hard lesson learned...but as with life, most lessons are learned the hard way. You now know to be mindful of such actions moving forward and your experience will hopefully serve as a data point to others who read this.

Again, don't let it get you down too much. Keep at it and I'm sure we'll be reading more success stories from you in the future.

Re: BOA Closed my Account

KeithW — Sat, 12 Jun 2021 17:07:41 GMT

Noted.

my Cap One cards have many times been maxed out then paid off when I am reimbursed. I use them for work related expenses and have never had any issues with huge usage swings. I guess it's just a variance in the companies.

Re: BOA Closed my Account

tcbofade — Sat, 12 Jun 2021 20:39:04 GMT

Exactly.

Capital One is fine with that. Navy Federal is fine with it too.

BofA is not. Chase is not.

There are many, many examples on both sides of this one.

Good luck!

Re: BOA Closed my Account

SouthJamaica — Sun, 13 Jun 2021 04:09:47 GMT

@KeithW wrote:
I have had a BOA CC for about 8 years. When I got it my score was in the mid 600s and I had to answer some questions and got manual approval. I have never had a late payment and have always paid more than the minimum balance. A few months ago my score jumped up to the low 700s after paying down my cards balances. I then put a $7k charge on my BOA card and have been paying it down with at a rate of $500 a week. This morning I get a letter saying my account is being closed.

My score has gone up, I am low risk and they made money of my account. Why close it?

Sorry this happened to you. In my experience they are a creepy bank, with no regard for their customers.

Re: BOA Closed my Account

babygirl1256 — Mon, 14 Jun 2021 07:05:08 GMT

Greetings KeithW ~ Gosh, that's really terrible that BoA closed your account . . . Perhaps you could speak with someone in underwriting to see if they would reopen the account. Try explaining the large purchase with them seeing that you have been paying $500.00 per week to reduce the balance. I'm not sure which CRA they pull from but they could have at least done a soft inquiry to see that your score had increased. Wishing you success in getting your account reopened.

Re: BOA Closed my Account

Harvey26 — Mon, 14 Jun 2021 14:48:24 GMT

@KeithW BOA is very very sensitive to high UTI. I used to work for them a number of years ago and remember a guy whose limit was slashed pretty significantly due to a 50k bal on his AMEX card with he stated that he PIF each month. I would call underwriting and see if you can get it restored and just explain why you made the charge and keep us updated

Re: BOA Closed my Account

Luxeedee — Wed, 16 Jun 2021 16:52:06 GMT

Exactly.

Capital One is fine with that. Navy Federal is fine with it too.

BofA is not. Chase is not.

There are many, many examples on both sides of this one.

Good luck!

Re: BOA Closed my Account

tcbofade — Wed, 16 Jun 2021 19:52:21 GMT

Citi doesn't like you carrying a high balance.

PenFed doesn't seem to mind.

No idea on USBank.

Good luck!

Re: BOA Closed my Account

kshurika — Thu, 17 Jun 2021 16:30:18 GMT

@SouthJamaica wrote:

Sorry this happened to you. In my experience they are a creepy bank, with no regard for their customers.

You took the words right out of my mouth. I wouldn't do business with BofA or Citi without a gun being held by head.

Re: BOA Closed my Account

KeithW — Thu, 17 Jun 2021 16:24:32 GMT

At this point I have plenty of cards and will probably just let this one go without trying to appeal. Barclays closed my account several years ago for no apparent reason. I never carried more than a 20% balance on it and never paid late, yet they closed it. I am going to chalk this up to unreliable cards, that I don't want anyway if they are going to pull this kind of behavior. Like I said, my Cap One and Chase, haven't ever done this, even when I had them maxed out years ago.

I did get a letter from BoA. They stated the reason for closing being: Current Economic and Loss Trends as well as a large charge to my account.

Sounds to me like house cleaning and they were looking for any excuse. Here is a credit card, but if you use it we will cancel it.

Re: BOA Closed my Account

babygirl1256 — Thu, 17 Jun 2021 16:30:12 GMT

KeithW . . . Great it worked out for you and your opted not to follow-up with BoA. Why on earth do creditors give the large CLs then cancel the card when the cardholder makes a large purchase?

Re: BOA Closed my Account

FinStar — Thu, 17 Jun 2021 16:34:35 GMT

At the risk of the discussion going further in circles and since the OP has already indicated not pursuing an appeal with the lender, this thread is now locked and closed to new messages.