United Explorer Denial

[Remedios]

@cczzll1611  of course you can get more than one. It may not be Chase, but there are plenty of lenders who would approve you.  

If this particular airline card isn't the only card that could be useful to you, I'd suggest you look at other lenders/options. 

Denials aren't pleasant because they interfere with our plans, but make a lemonade in the form of another plan. 

Since you only have one card, there is plenty of reawrds you could be getting with additional card, you just need to identify your spend pattern and see what would work for you. 

[cczzll1611]

---

@SDMarik wrote:

There has to be something holding your score down, as mentioned before your score should be much higher. If chase claims they saw it, it has to be there somewhere. Are you 100% positive they didn't pull TU or EQ?

Is it possible for an issuer to HP a bureau and have a delay in it hitting your file?

---

My only guess is my 30% usage on my one credit card and student loans. My score did dip significantly (20-30 points) when my first car loan was paid off in November. 

Only Experian shows the hard pull. 

[cczzll1611]

No other card really makes sense for me, since I exclusively fly United. My airport is a hub. The airport my family lives by is a hub. My employer is based in NYC. My main overseas route is a major United hub. Other cards just don't have the good return on United that their cards have. 

I guess all I can do is wait a year and see how things improve. 

[blossom_rebuilding]

Sorry about this denial, OP. Your profile honestly sounds quite a bit like mine bck when I applied for this card at the end of 2018; relatively high income (yours is higher than mine was at the time), recently new clean profile, six figures in student loans. I also had pretty high utilization at the time; probably around 20%, but also a very long credit history. A few key differences that might have made the difference:

• My score at the time of approval was higher than 700. I think it may have been in the 715-730 neighborhood. The hit that your score took due to the recently paid off loan may be a bit of bad timing. The score hit is temporary and will certainly rebound soon, so when it is solidly in the 700s several months running, it may be a good time to reapply.
• I had old derogs (delinquencies and one charge off) that had been off of my credit report for probably about a year at the time that I applied. Maybe your derog was still too recent that it lingered somewhere, even if it should have been completely removed from your report. I have some old closed accounts sitting on my credit report past the seven year mark (no derogs though, thankfully), so maybe something similar happened when Chase pulled your report.
• My application was pre-pandemic. I only mention that because I think we have seen surprises in profiles that would have been approved pre-pandemic appearing more risky now. I don't think it's necessarily right or fair, but I think given the similarities in our profiles, it might be a factor. As with everything, YMMV, so this is just an observation.

I hope you consider other travel card options, and maybe reapply in the future. Good luck to you!

[KJinNC]

30% utilization on your one card may concern them. Add the loan amount and the charge-off and I can see how this outcome might have happened.

There may not be another airline card that makes sense for you right now, but there could be a general travel card (eg Venture) or some other card type (eg Hilton, Marriott, dining, grocery, etc) that does make sense.

Good luck!

[cczzll1611]

---

@blossom_rebuilding wrote:

Sorry about this denial, OP. Your profile honestly sounds quite a bit like mine bck when I applied for this card at the end of 2018; relatively high income (yours is higher than mine was at the time), recently new clean profile, six figures in student loans. I also had pretty high utilization at the time; probably around 20%, but also a very long credit history. A few key differences that might have made the difference:

• My score at the time of approval was higher than 700. I think it may have been in the 715-730 neighborhood. The hit that your score took due to the recently paid off loan may be a bit of bad timing. The score hit is temporary and will certainly rebound soon, so when it is solidly in the 700s several months running, it may be a good time to reapply.
• I had old derogs (delinquencies and one charge off) that had been off of my credit report for probably about a year at the time that I applied. Maybe your derog was still too recent that it lingered somewhere, even if it should have been completely removed from your report. I have some old closed accounts sitting on my credit report past the seven year mark (no derogs though, thankfully), so maybe something similar happened when Chase pulled your report.
• My application was pre-pandemic. I only mention that because I think we have seen surprises in profiles that would have been approved pre-pandemic appearing more risky now. I don't think it's necessarily right or fair, but I think given the similarities in our profiles, it might be a factor. As with everything, YMMV, so this is just an observation.

I hope you consider other travel card options, and maybe reapply in the future. Good luck to you!

---

Thank you! This was all extremely helpful. 

I agree that maybe waiting until everything is in the 710+ range is smarter. The charge off was from March 2015, so you are probably correct in thinking perhaps it's still visible in some way and/or fell off too recently. 

I'm going to wait and see if, perhaps, I'll have some luck in the fall or winter in getting the card.

[Hoben02]

If you don't have any other chase cards have you tried applying for one of the sapphire cards becuz those have transferable miles and one of the transfer partners is United. Also are you near a chase branch you can walk-in and see if you are preapproved to save yourself a pull

[7774x]

---

@cczzll1611 wrote:

---

@Remedios wrote:

If charge off isn't Chase card and Chase is aware of it, it's not off all reports. They cannot "see" what isn't reported, or what wasn't reported at the time you applied. 

You're right about other people being approved with student loans, they aren't issue on their own unless they significantly increase DTI, but in the presence of other factors, everything is an issue. 

With charge off removed, even if you paid off auto loan, there has to be other negatives present or really high utilization for scores not to be much higher. 

Go over your reports and see what's reporting, upper 600s to low 700s aren't typical for mature clean profile. 

If you couldn't get decision reversed during recon, give it time and try at some point in the future when your situation improves. 

---

When I first got the "7-10 business days" message on the automated line, I called Chase to confirm the denial. The man I spoke to was super helpful and suggested I call all the credit agencies to confirm my reports — which I did. All three said I had no charge offs, delinquincies or collections on my reports; one rep was kind of hard to get an answer from since it appeared English was not their first language, and they kept repeating "These items should fall off after seven years" and didn't understand I was asking to see if I had any charge offs still showing. Eventually they said "No," but maybe that was it? However, that was Equifax and not Experian. My Experian account shows nothing but my student loans, credit card and current car loan ($10k always paid on time). 

It's just super frustrating because I thought I was on the right track. Disheartening to see people with like 10+ credit cards and I can't get more than the one I have. If I have this much trouble from unemployment, I feel terrible for anyone who was affected by the recession. I assume they were screwed just like I was. 

---

Don't let it bother you .. I have the Chase British Air  card .. applied for the Explorer card .. Denied..Chase said ..too many new  cards ..2    .. 760 score

[Mdowning30]

I was denied for the United Gateway card earlier this month, win some lose some...