@ACW3rdIM wrote:
@seattletravels wrote:SP are only visible to you when pulling your credit report. However, companies certainly have their own internal tracking and scoring algorithms based on your behaviors with them which would probably include prequal data.
Interesting. So if multiple credit card apps with all the hard pulls in a short time (i.e., over 12 months) indicates greater credit-seeking risk, I wonder what an issuer like Amex (since that's the issuer at the core of this thread) thinks when they pull up someone's account and see that the person has been coming to the Amex site and clicking the "Check for Pre-Qualified Offers" link every week or so, or that they're clicking "Apply Now" on a few cards every so often to see if they get the 'pre-approved' message, or the dreaded 'Expanding your relationship with us' groin kick of false hope. Might the multiple inquiries on the website so often possibly be seen as suspect credit-shopping behavior?
You mean there are people who only do that once a week or so? 
Seriously though, in the past 12 months Amex has issued me 5 cards. And not only do they know how often I check for prequals, when they do a soft pull they also know how much I've applied elsewhere
Amex seems to base their decisions in large part on your history with them.
It's possible they could treat using prequal negatively but I dont necessarily see the correlation between using that and seeking credit. You could be checking to see if you qualify, checking your rate, etc - I think there are many reasons a person might use it. As long as you aren't actually applying I don't see why they would be too scared off by it.
