Navy Federal Approval Chances?

[Anonymous]

I have been a member of Navy Federal for two months now. I finally received a credit card offer from them (Navy Federal Platinum credit card). I received it at my e-mail address.

It has a promo code but it also has an APR range. There is NO definite APR listed.

Reading this thread from four years ago,
https://ficoforums.myfico.com/t5/Credit-Cards/Navy-Federal-offer/td-p/3277568
the original poster received an acceptance code, but was declined due to a high balance. I am also carrying a high balance. After the next statement it will be 54% utilization on one card; no utilization on my other card. I also have two student loans, one of which was deferred two different times and the interest has pushed it to about $400 above the original amount.

I have no late payments or anything bad on my credit reports.

What do you think my approval chances are?  Do you expect me to be disappointed like the original poster in the other thread?  I want to take advantage of the 0% intro APR for balance transfers.

Thank you.

[Brian_Earl_Spilner]

NFCU does whatever they want. There's no rhyme or reason and nobody here has been able to figure them out. If you can afford the hard pull, just do it. I did it 15 mins after opening my account and was approved and my credit is not very good right now.

[Brian_Earl_Spilner]

Should also note, their criteria is basically the same for all the cards except the flagship, so just apply for the one you want. I did the cash rewards.

[FinStar]

Is the solicitation a pre-approved offer or an invitation to apply?  Based on what you've briefly shared, I would not set my expectations as "high" and just be suprised *if* approved.   If your utilization is on the high end, I would hold off until things are more optimal.  Then again, some folks have been approved as low as $500, so it just depends whether you want to take that gamble.

[Anonymous]

It says, "You're pre-selected for our Platinum card."

The e-mail also contains a promo code, and it says the offer will end in August.  But it gives a range for the APR, nothing solid.

[egghead88]

It’s a pretty established fact.. it you get an APR range and not a set one, it’s marketing and not a pre-aproved offer. Also, it’s probably hard for anyone to made an educated guess about your approva chances w/o additional information I.e aaoa, tu and eq score etc. bottom line... if you want the card and YOU feel good about your score, dive in. Nfcu has been all over the place with their approvals and since they use their own internal scoring, you never know. You might get one of 5 digits approvals. Good luck!

[FinStar]

OP, just for clarification, pre-selected ≠ pre-approved.  It is simply a marketing solicitation that, just like a pre-approved offer, contains an offer code.  The latter is simply a tracking mechanism pegged to the invite. 

[Anonymous]

All right; thank you, everyone.  I will probably pass on applying.

I have good scores and a long but very thin credit history.  The high utilization is killing me though. 

The balance comes down every month though.

[FinStar]

As long as you're making progress toward your goals that's what really matters OP.   Give it time, get that utilization to acceptable levels and you will definitely have the opportunity to score a CC with NAVY down the road.  While they may be all over the place as far as approvals and whatnot, they are certainly pretty flexible.

[Anonymous]

Thank you.