Hello.
Just got my new NFCU Platinum, and although I don't need to BT anything, it got me thinking.
Do you guys and gals think there are any negative effects behind the curtains by using them? Like, do most lenders keep track of your BTs and how often. I know amex does. Wouldn't it be risky behavior to always be BTing your balances? I would think that if you do it too often, it would raise flags. In addition, I doubt they like having their 0% BT offers being taken advantage of often. The fact that most lenders have removed those offers in the current economic state shows they don't want to be the ones left holding the bag.
Just some random thoughts.
I have never done this, so no real experience to relate. I know that taco has shared that he does, and he has seen some small amount of AA when his scores dip as a result. Not widespread problems, though.
After doing them repeatedly for 13 years with Bank of America it has proved disastrous. They raised my credit lines to $99,900. AU had the same thing happen to her.
More recently in the past 4 years, PenFed, NFCU, Discover, US Bank, Comenity, Citi, and Chase all had the same disastrous results. Doing BTs resulted in them increasing credit lines, sometimes automatically.
Edit: To be serious for a moment, the key is that BTs are fine as long as you are not just making minimum or near-minimum payments every month and your debt is not escalating as a result (pyramiding debt). Also the most lenders taking BT offers away is very much YMMV. I still have a lot of them available to me, and there are many cards that still offer them for new cardholders.
@K-in-Boston wrote:After doing them repeatedly for 13 years with Bank of America it has proved disastrous. They raised my credit lines to $99,900. AU had the same thing happen to her.
More recently in the past 4 years, PenFed, NFCU, Discover, US Bank, Comenity, Citi, and Chase all had the same disastrous results. Doing BTs resulted in them increasing credit lines, sometimes automatically.
Edit: To be serious for a moment, the key is that BTs are fine as long as you are not just making minimum or near-minimum payments every month and your debt is not escalating as a result (pyramiding debt). Also the most lenders taking BT offers away is very much YMMV. I still have a lot of them available to me, and there are many cards that still offer them for new cardholders.
It was just a random question. Was thinking of charging some stuff on my amex and BT to NFCU to show some use because I don't have a use for it in the immediate future. That led to me remembering amex taking away SUBs for BT abuse, but nobody has said what that abuse is. That led to me wondering what abuse is and whether or not other lenders track that you're not actually paying your cards, but BTing the balance to another card. Which led to me making the thread.
And, you're profile is not typical. While it may be YMMV, based on what I'm reading everywhere, most people have had BT offers dry up on them and needing to apply for new cards to get them.
Just received more Penfed BT checks today, Chase Last week and HSBC the week before that.
From my perspective, they have not dried up. I guess profile driven ...YMMV
No issues initializing multiple BTs as well. No issues at all.
So BT away!! I've done it to hold on to some extra cash at times. And also just to show a little use on several CCs.
B-town baller aka @K-in-Boston is spot on.
I ran a BT on my only Navy CC for almost two years back to back.
They rewarded me with another $49k in available credit.
@Brian_Earl_Spilner wrote:It was just a random question. Was thinking of charging some stuff on my amex and BT to NFCU to show some use because I don't have a use for it in the immediate future. That led to me remembering amex taking away SUBs for BT abuse, but nobody has said what that abuse is. That led to me wondering what abuse is and whether or not other lenders track that you're not actually paying your cards, but BTing the balance to another card. Which led to me making the thread.
And, you're profile is not typical. While it may be YMMV, based on what I'm reading everywhere, most people have had BT offers dry up on them and needing to apply for new cards to get them.
I was just being a goof after a few weeks of "the sky is falling" posts. There was a serious answer in there. 
As long as your balances are not escalating month over month, you're not getting into very high utilization, and you're making decent payments toward the balance(s), the simple act of doing a balance transfer or transfers should have no more chance of AA than getting @Gmood1 to alphabetize his signature.
😂😂😂😂😂😂
Yeah, the chance of that happening is roughly the same as me color coordinating my signature.
