Chance of being approved for CSR?

[Anonymous]

Hi all,

New to the forums and trying to take my credit score more seriously. I've signed up the the Ultimate 3B for a couple of month to see how far I can go.

So here's the info and I'll try to be as detailed as possible without getting into much of the specifics.

My EQ / EX / TU are : 669 / 659 / 670

I have 5 credit cards with the utilization / CL below:

1. Discover: $6,000 / 85%
2. Citibank: $4,000 / 45%
3. Best Buy: $3000 / 45%
4. Chase Slate:  $1000 / 0%
5. Capital One:  $5000 / 50%

1 Derogatory mark for a medical bill, that I've already disputed with Experian and they are removing it (just not updated yet)

No late payments since I had my first credit card

I have a Chase Checking account for about 7-8 years now

Income: $70K (combined income with wife is about $130K)

I've gotten the Capital One last year and requested a CLI on my Best Buy Nov 2017. No other inquiries besides those two

AAoA is ~3 years with 4 and 5 months being highest

I am ALSO pre-approved for the Chase Sapphire Preferred , Freedom, and Freedom Unlimited. 

My utilizations aren't great because I mainly just do auto-minimum payments and just use my debit;  it's not that I can't pay it off ( I have 100% on time payments and I just made a $800 payment on my Slate), but rather I am just lazy LOL. I recently got married so my wife and I want to start traveling a lot more and thus need to get a good travel card. I've started a plan to pay about $1,000 to $2,00 per month towards my balances NOW because of my high utilization, which should hopefully get me into the 700s by summer.

We are talking about taking a trip to Asia in a couple of weeks and we also have a couple of things we want to purchase when we get back. I really want to take advantage of the CSR Bonus by paying the expenses with the CSR. I am thinking about going into a Chase branch tomorrow and seeing if I get pre-approved for the CSR. What do you think my chances would be since I am pre-approved for the CSP and I plan on stating my income in the combined income of my wife and I?

Thanks all!

[Anonymous]

Unfortunately, I dont think you will have a chance. I tried to get a CSP with much better scores and was denied. When I tried to recon they probed me and judged every little thing. My scores at time of app for CSP was 750ish. If your pre approved for the CSP I would give that a go.

[LuckyB338]

As far as income goes you are pretty solid, and taking in to account the lenght of your relationship with chase I'd say there's a decent chance that you will get an approval. I'm prepping for CSP/CSR and I've done quite a bit of research, and from what I've read your util. and scores (chase likes 735-750 range) are definitely the neg. weight. Since you have a good relationship with chase, even in the case of a rejection you are probably a call to recon away from getting approved.

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymouswrote:
Unfortunately, I dont think you will have a chance. I tried to get a CSP with much better scores and was denied. When I tried to recon they probed me and judged every little thing. My scores at time of app for CSP was 750ish. If your pre approved for the CSP I would give that a go.

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Were the other factors relatively similar to mine?

Such as no late payments, no derogatory marks, income, inquiries past two years, AAoA?

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymouswrote:
Looking at your information I see some red flags that any credit analyst would flag right away.

First - You don't have any current credit limits of at least $10,000, the minimum SL for CSR, Chase doesn't like to be the first one to give you that limit, combined with your Slate only having a 1k limit.

Second - You have a very high Utilization only a lot of your cards, regardless of income that's grounds for denial.

Those are the cons.

Here are positives - You've had a Chase relationship through your checking and your Slate which helps a little.

My recommendation -

First - There's no such thing as a preapproval for CSR so going in branch they'll say just about anything to get you to apply because it looks good for their numbers.

Game Plan -

Pay your balances down at least below 30% BEFORE applying, then once it reflects in your FICO scores/reports you're almost guaranteed an approval.

You mentioned you'd like this card for Summer Travel, you have a good 3 months to whip your report into shape! In that time I would strongly recommend just paying your balances down to what you can.

One more thought - Since you're not using your Slate Card, and it's main feature is only available when you first open it, PC it to a Freedom or Freedom Unlimited Card.

That's my two cents, Good Luck!

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Thanks for the detailed info!

When you say no pre-approval, the chances of getting approved in-branch is the same as online? I did some research and saw that people had better luck in-brach.

I wanted to get this card for my trip in the next couple of weeks. If I try to get it down to 40% by next week, how would that fare?

For the Slate, I've only kept it cuz of the free FICO credit score each month 

[Anonymous]

I know some people say that Chase doesn't like to be the prybar when it comes to CLs, but my experience is the opposite. In two different cases (Chase Freedom 2010) and recently (Chase IHG 2017) they gave me CLs that exceeded what I had at the time. Freedom at 5K when my highest limit was 2K. And IHG at 24K when my highest non Credit Union/non store card limit was 15K. 

I actually think you may have a shot. But I would wait to get an offer/in branch approval so you're not completely going in blind. 

[Anonymous]

Hi all,

Just wanted to give you guys an update!

I went into a Chase bank yesterday and I applied for the CSP and got approved with the scores I have!

My rational was that I can get the CSP now without the AF and fix my scores, then when when I do get the AF, I will have better FICO scores by then and I can PC if I wanted to.

 Also, you can get 55K points with the CSP, which comes out to $687.5 (with free AU), whereas the CSR you can $750. I think you're only getting $62.50 on the monetary difference and that's fine with me if I don't get that right now.

[Anonymous]

Congrats on approval ? what was SL? going in branch works for the better.

[Anonymous]

SL is $7.K, and yes I think going in branch helps too. The banker was really helpful and he even called afterwards to get me overnight shipping! It should be an arriving by tomorrow

[Anonymous]

Chase most likely needs the account to have at least $10k limit to product change it to the CSR, and increasing limit of an account with Chase is almost always hard pull, unless you got other accounts so you can reassign the limits. Also they probably don't PC it during your first year of cardmembership. But enjoy the new CSP for now.