Two successes, but one better

Howlingcoyote · ‎09-10-2015

I'm writing this because I'm a lurker who has been reading, and I wanted to thank you all for what you write and add my own data point.

I've been with Capital One for many many years and didn't have a credit line above $500 until a year ago. I was mostly content with this - I had some financial difficulties and baddies in 2009/2010. But I didn't realize I was hurting my credit by not obtaining a bit more credit.

My approximate Transunion (the lowest of the 3) was around 633. Everything else was within 10 points.

So after reading through some of these boards, I decided to go ahead and see if I could apply for an increased limit with Capitall One. They had increased it from $1,250 to $1,750 earlier in the year, but only four months ago. Through the automatic system I was declined. I'll find their backdoor number and see if I can get them to reconsider tomorrow. (Everyone loves Fridays right?)

So I then went and applied for the Barclay's card. I got approved but for a very tiny $500 limit. I'm debating whether or not to call them to reconsider.

Last, I went back to Cap One and applied for the Quicksilver Rewards. Now I definitely got approved for a Quicksilver card, not sure it was the Rewards version. Approved for $3K.

As for baddies, I have two old baddies, one of which doesn't seem like it's mine. I'll be fighting that in court. I had late student loan payments up until 9 months ago, when I finally remembered to put it on autopay, and the only other set of baddies was from 2013 with B of A. I was working with them to pay off but times were tough, and I asked to skip payments. I asked if this would harm my credit, and I was told no. So as a result I have a 150 day baddie from 2013. But I paid every penny to B of A, so I'm going to try goodwill.

As for good tradelines: A paid $6K personal loan with my credit union, A paid car, another car I've been paying on for 44-45 months with no lates, 8 years of perfect history with Capital One, except for maybe one overlimit issue. The landlord. And another former credit card, where I had some baddies, but they purposely didn't respond to the inquiry when I challenged it on my report.

Anonymous · ‎09-11-2015

@Howlingcoyote wrote:
I'm writing this because I'm a lurker who has been reading, and I wanted to thank you all for what you write and add my own data point.

I've been with Capital One for many many years and didn't have a credit line above $500 until a year ago. I was mostly content with this - I had some financial difficulties and baddies in 2009/2010. But I didn't realize I was hurting my credit by not obtaining a bit more credit.

My approximate Transunion (the lowest of the 3) was around 633. Everything else was within 10 points.

So after reading through some of these boards, I decided to go ahead and see if I could apply for an increased limit with Capitall One. They had increased it from $1,250 to $1,750 earlier in the year, but only four months ago. Through the automatic system I was declined. I'll find their backdoor number and see if I can get them to reconsider tomorrow. (Everyone loves Fridays right?)

So I then went and applied for the Barclay's card. I got approved but for a very tiny $500 limit. I'm debating whether or not to call them to reconsider.

Last, I went back to Cap One and applied for the Quicksilver Rewards. Now I definitely got approved for a Quicksilver card, not sure it was the Rewards version. Approved for $3K.

As for baddies, I have two old baddies, one of which doesn't seem like it's mine. I'll be fighting that in court. I had late student loan payments up until 9 months ago, when I finally remembered to put it on autopay, and the only other set of baddies was from 2013 with B of A. I was working with them to pay off but times were tough, and I asked to skip payments. I asked if this would harm my credit, and I was told no. So as a result I have a 150 day baddie from 2013. But I paid every penny to B of A, so I'm going to try goodwill.

As for good tradelines: A paid $6K personal loan with my credit union, A paid car, another car I've been paying on for 44-45 months with no lates, 8 years of perfect history with Capital One, except for maybe one overlimit issue. The landlord. And another former credit card, where I had some baddies, but they purposely didn't respond to the inquiry when I challenged it on my report.

Great job!

Howlingcoyote · ‎09-19-2015

I actually called both CapOne and Barclay's to see if we can do better with the CLI on my Cap One Platinum and the initial $500 limit.

I didn't escalate the Cap One... they basically said no, but very nicely.

I did escalate the Barclay's one. They said it would be a hard pull and I said "No. But you guys have just pulled it 7 days ago." Then I asked for a manager, who started with the HP disclosure and I said "No. But you guys have pulled it 7 days ago." She listened. Then she transferred me over and explained that I had the hard pull 7 days ago to the next guy who was an analyst. He asked me a few questions about my job and income. I made a point to be very pleasant and accomodating (actually in all the cases above) and only asked for a $500 bump. I explained it might look psychologically bad later to have that initial $500 credit line if someone was doing a manual look at my report for a mortgage in two years. He granted my request.

I'll escalate Cap One on Tuesday. Mondays suck for everyone.