Thank you so much for this post! I applied by-phone for an additional card on my AMEX account and was perplexed when the represenative informed me that I wasn't instantly approved, indicating that "additional information was required to continue processing my application". (In the essence of full disclosure, many years ago in college I was irresponsible with my credit, but I have worked tirelessly over the last decade to achieve excellent scores with all 3 bureaus). I already have a Platinum AMEX Delta card and was applying for a Gold AMEX Delta card to use for business-related travel (because my organization doesn't issue travel cards), and I was admittedly worried sick when I was told the application wasn't instantly approved. To make matters worse, the rep then told me that I would have to wait "7-10 days for a letter to come in the mail" that would explain the reason the application couldn't be immediately processed. Since I'm slightly paranoid about my credit now (which I honestly believe is some type of "credit PTSD" that I'm suffering from my "bad credit" days!), I knew that I wouldn't be able to wait to a week+ to find out what the issue was; hence, I came to this forum hoping to find some suggestions.
Thankfully, I came across your post and called one of the AMEX numbers that you listed (the "app status" one) and was almost immediately connected to a live voice! Fortunately, they simply wanted to verify that it was indeed "me" applying for the new account and not someone assuming my identity. After confirming my identity, they finished "processing" the account and it was approved.
Thanks again for the AWESOME post! VERY useful!
