topic Re: Amex questions in Credit Cards

Amex questions

SRT4kid93 — Mon, 08 Dec 2025 20:31:57 GMT

We know that Amex doesn't like bankruptcy at all. This has been shown as Amex can be very reluctant to give cards to those with bankruptcy and getting a CLI can be near impossible as well.

so here are my questions

1) what about charge offs/collections? Has anyone noticed that it's exponentially harder to achieve cards/increases with charge offs?

2) what about late payments?

it doesn't seem like derogs have the same affect as bankruptcy. As those with late payments are still able to get CLi's. And the 3x increase doesn't seem to be severely impacted by the presence of a late payment either. At least from what I've read.

I don't have enough data points on charge offs to say one way or the other.

Re: Amex questions

JoeRockhead — Mon, 08 Dec 2025 21:47:10 GMT

Charge off and collection accounts with Amex will get you shut down (obviously). Charge off and collections outside of Amex will get you balance chased and also possibly shut down. In BK, if you haven't burned them, it's 61 months in the dog house. If you burned them, it's much longer. How much longer depends on how bad the burn was.

Just as every other lender, they have their own risk assessment on customers based on how their responsibilities are managed, and they react accordingly to minimize their risk.

Re: Amex questions

SRT4kid93 — Mon, 08 Dec 2025 23:08:33 GMT

What about older charge offs?

like let's say you defaulted on a capital 1 card 5 years ago and you now have an Amex card?

A bankruptcy (even an old one) can severely hinder you. Like you said, it can be years before you can get approved even if you didn't burn Amex. And once you get a card, increases are almost impossible.

Is there any proof that the presence of charge offs or late payments severely hinders your ability to get increases/cards in the same/similar way to bankruptcy ?

Re: Amex questions

Jessie — Mon, 08 Dec 2025 23:56:59 GMT

No credit card company like any of these things. One difference with Amex is they only have cards for good credit or better. So there's less of a fallback option.

Re: Amex questions

Patient957 — Tue, 09 Dec 2025 00:40:27 GMT

@SRT4kid93 wrote:
What about older charge offs?

like let's say you defaulted on a capital 1 card 5 years ago and you now have an Amex card?

Yes, of course, they're going to hold it against you, obviously.

Asking for a friend?

Re: Amex questions

SRT4kid93 — Tue, 09 Dec 2025 01:04:46 GMT

@Patient957

No friend, just curious.

any issuer would hold negative items against you. Yea. But Amex does it in a very specific way.

many issuers will still give you a card/increases with bankruptcy. But Amex won't (at least until it's reached a certain age)

So they have strict enforced policies others don't. I was curious if there was any evidence of a strict policy against charge offs/lates. It wasn't a generalized question on whether negative items are bad. More a specific question on whether or not there was evidence of a specific policy

Me for example, I have a late and I was able to get increases.

Re: Amex questions

Zoostation1 — Wed, 10 Dec 2025 05:10:34 GMT

While Amex still has the 61mo rule if they were not involved in the BK, they have softened up when it comes to giving CLIs with a BK still reporting. It used to be very rare to get a CLI from them until the BK was no longer reporting. Whatever your SL was, would stay your CL until then 95%+ of the time. Within the last couple of years they have eased up on that. While I didn't get the 3x CLIs, I went from $5000 SL(1/2023) to $7500 (2/2025) and then to $15k (8/2025). The BK7 reports till 11/2027.

Re: Amex questions

SRT4kid93 — Wed, 10 Dec 2025 05:53:59 GMT

@Zoostation1

Interesting,

I have seen a couple stories here and then of people with bankruptcy getting increases. But I just chalked it up to "they are one of the lucky ones" I didn't know Amex was becoming more forgiving or changing their policy.

I would be very curious to see the following information

1) % of people with bankruptcy that were able to get CLI

2) % of people with charge offs/collections that were able to get CLI

3) % of people with 90+ day lates that were able to get CLI

4) % of people with 30/60 that were able to get CLI

obviously this information will never be released. But I am curious to know how much late payments and charge offs affect increases and approvals when compared to bk.

Re: Amex questions

BrutalBodyShots — Wed, 10 Dec 2025 19:36:50 GMT

I think the difficulty when trying to isolate a single variable with anything credit-related (presence of charge off, 90D+ late, <90D late, etc) is that there are always an infinite number of other variables at play. So you might find someone for example that says they received an Amex CLI with a charge off present... but maybe they've had that Amex card for (say) 20 years. Or maybe they cut 100% statement balances monthly and pay in full, showing a genuine "need" for a greater limit. Those are just examples of course.

Re: Amex questions

Zoostation1 — Tue, 16 Dec 2025 01:44:06 GMT

@BrutalBodyShots Agree in general. Though while I think Amex prefers to see balances reported, I don't think they care about high reported balances in the way C1 does. I've never had a reported balance over 17% on my BCP and that was more than a year before I got a CLI (despite usually letting it report naturally).

Re: Amex questions

SRT4kid93 — Tue, 16 Dec 2025 02:47:14 GMT

I am curious to know how much Amex cared about reported balances.

I have paid my balance down to $0 on my BCP every month and so far that hasn't negatively affected me. I just got a 3x increase. Maybe it will start to matter more as my limit gets higher. Not totally sure

In my experience when it comes to Amex your credit score matters far more than reported balances. I think as long as you are spending money, they don't care if you let it post. But like i said, I'm not totally sure how much they want to see reported balances

Re: Amex questions

BrutalBodyShots — Tue, 16 Dec 2025 03:03:18 GMT

@Zoostation1 wrote:
Though while I think Amex prefers to see balances reported, I don't think they care about high reported balances in the way C1 does.

I don't disagree at all there. Capital One is known to be one of the most conservative when it comes to CLIs, where Amex is known to be one of (if not the most) giving even to those that lightly use their accounts.

@SRT4kid93, what evidence do you have that credit score matters as a distinct variable as opposed to overall credit profile in general?

Re: Amex questions

SRT4kid93 — Tue, 16 Dec 2025 04:14:19 GMT

@BrutalBodyShots

Personal experience has told me that 700 score is absolutely a threshold. Being below that hurts your chances greatly.

Here is a datapoint from another member. i had 3-4 other posts regarding the 700 threshold but I think i deleted the screenshots a while back by accident

if you are really curious you can research it, last time i looked i was able to find half a dozen examples in maybe 5-10 minutes. Many other people experienced the same thing as me. Amex would deny them for an increase over and over until they got over 700. can also try to find more examples as well if you want

Re: Amex questions

BrutalBodyShots — Tue, 16 Dec 2025 04:15:51 GMT

@SRT4kid93, for me personally, that's not a data point. If Amex provides you with a CLI denial letter that states "We weren't able to increase your credit limit because your score was below 700" I'd agree with you 100%.

It's perfectly possible that some other metric such as the element of time was satisfied. Perhaps the Amex account in question needed (say) 2 years of time to elapse before a CLI is possible. Just before someone hits that 2 year mark, their score ticks up from 697 to 701. They may incorrectly correlate their ability to achieve a CLI at that point with their score being 700+, when it in fact had to do with something else completely.

Re: Amex questions

SRT4kid93 — Tue, 16 Dec 2025 04:28:36 GMT

@BrutalBodyShots

absolutely it's possible. For me that was not the case, it seemed purely score related. The only thing that changed was a dip in utilization bringing my score from 696 to 704. The drop in utilization was 13% to 7%. enough to increase my score, but Im not sure it was enough to change a denial into an approval.

Maybe it was the utilization change, i don't know for sure. But when I found several others also quoting the 700 score threshold. It made me think maybe we were on to something. For sure we can't write off the possibility.

Also, I understand this next point isn't exactly "a scientific" analysis. But, people on this forum tend to be more educated than most, so i like to give them the benefit of the doubt. I assume they are educated enough to be able to decipher that. The screenshot I shared was a frequent contributor. In order to get that rank you need to be around for a bit, and would have certainly learned a lot along the way.

for example, if their score crossed the 700 mark because their average age of accounts reached 2 years. I think they would be able to see that. So I guess the question is, what are the chances of 6 different educated people all missing key information like that?

Re: Amex questions

BrutalBodyShots — Tue, 16 Dec 2025 04:29:20 GMT

The point is it can be any number of different things. Credit profile is King to credit score. You mentioned your utilization being the change that resulted in your sub 700 score going over 700. It's very possible that for your profile, it was the utilization that mattered (be it percentage or dollars) not the score. There's no way to tell. That's why I brought up denial reasons. When you were denied a CLI, what was the reason you were provided with? Utilization? Score? Something else entirely?

Re: Amex questions

SRT4kid93 — Tue, 16 Dec 2025 04:48:21 GMT

My denial reason said "fico score". Typically they will list the reasons why your score is too low below as well. I honestly don't remember the "sub reasons". I don't remember seeing any at all. All I remember is the "fico score" reason. doesn't mean they weren't there. I just don't remember seeing them/don't remember what they said.

As far as i know, They keep record of the denial letters for card applications but not credit limit increase applications.

you are 100% right that profile matters more, I'm just saying I'm not sure we can 100% rule out the possibility that a 700 fico score is a threshold of sorts for Amex. I think it would be foolish to completely rule out the possibility.

and I think you agree. It doesn't sound like you are completely ruling it out. You are simply saying it's possible it was something else as well.

i agree

Re: Amex questions

BrutalBodyShots — Tue, 16 Dec 2025 04:59:46 GMT

I'm not completely ruling it out, I just personally don't believe that a 700 score threshold exists. I know for certain I've seen people get CLIs on Amex cards with sub 700 FICO scores. Maybe not 3X CLIs, but increases have been had.

That "Your credit score..." is shown on all Amex denial letters that I've seen, regardless of score. People have seen it with perfect 850 FICO scores. It's just poorly presented the way Amex displays it, IMO.

Re: Amex questions

SRT4kid93 — Tue, 16 Dec 2025 05:21:16 GMT

@BrutalBodyShots

i don't think it's necessarily a "hard threshold". But I think it's possible it does greatly improve your odds as a whole, and certainly improves chances for the full 3x increase. But I'm also not afraid to admit when I'm wrong/could be wrong, and I always try to respect seniority.

in the grand scheme of if all, I'm still new. Sure I found a couple possible data points. But i will always respect the knowledge and experience of those who have been doing this longer than me. If you don't think the threshold exists i take your opinion seriously

Re: Amex questions

BrutalBodyShots — Tue, 16 Dec 2025 05:45:47 GMT

I don't think it exists because as we agreed previously, credit profile is King to score. Someone with a 690 score can have a stronger profile, more worthy of a credit limit increase than someone with a 760 score. Certainly Amex or anyone in underwriting is aware of that, so putting a number in place as a threshold that may end up making a bad call doesn't make any sense to me.

Cornelius has an Amex card that he uses once every 6 months just to keep it open. It's his only card with a $1000 limit. He's got a 760 score.

Rupert has an Amex card that he uses daily. He's also got a $1000 limit. He cuts statement balances near $1000 every month and always pays in full. His score is 690.

It would be a bad business decision for Amex to be willing to grant Cornelius a CLI (which they very well may do, since Amex is super giving) but not be willing to grant one to Rupert who A - Clearly needs it more and B - Is exhibiting far stronger responsible use of revolving credit just because Rupert has a sub 700 score.

To illustrate how silly this point actually would be, if Amex were to grant Rupert a (say) 3X CLI, their utilization would be dropped by two thirds and their scores would bump up well above 700 to (say) 730. They however aren't any less risky post-CLI, nor are they any more deserving of a CLI just because their score bumped up 40 points.