Just Applied AMEX...few questions

[Anonymous]

Hello all, I've browsed around on the forums for a while now, and decided to post with a few questions that I haven't ran across yet. I applied for an AMEX student credit card today. I understand they can be a difficult student card to get, and I recently got approved for a Discover student card (more on that). I have a EX score of 740ish. I applied for the Discover student card a few days back and got approved with the highest CL they give students, but canceled today because their customer service turned into a disaster trying to verify some information. Long story short, I canceled the application and applied for the AMEX student card today. Will the inquiry on my report from Discover hurt my AMEX chances? Also, I am a student and don't make much money (under 6k a year). I have a clean credit record with a 2 year old Visa that I pay off every month. What kind of offer should I expect? Does income determine if you are approved or does it determine how high you CL is? What are my chances of approval? Thanks!

[Anonymous]

Hi Decoy, welcome to the forum!

I don't *think* 1 inquiry will hurt your chances for Amex, but I've seen weirder declines. As a student with a student's income, I would expect about a $1000 CL, which is the minimum with Amex.

If for some reason you do get a decline on the Amex Student Blue, you can always try for the regular Blue instead (yes, this has happened before). If you apply on the same day, they use the same inquiry so it won't ding you for another hard.

[Anonymous]

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FretlessMayhem wrote:
Hi Decoy, welcome to the forum!

I don't *think* 1 inquiry will hurt your chances for Amex, but I've seen weirder declines. As a student with a student's income, I would expect about a $1000 CL, which is the minimum with Amex.

If for some reason you do get a decline on the Amex Student Blue, you can always try for the regular Blue instead (yes, this has happened before). If you apply on the same day, they use the same inquiry so it won't ding you for another hard.

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I got my student card 4.5 years ago and the CL is only $500.00 on it. I tried a CLI once and was declined saying "Student cards must be open 5 years to recieve a CLI". I've since got a blue card which i'm happy with but i'll try to get a CLI on my student in April next year just for the heck of it.

[haulingthescoreup]

OP, sorry to hear that you had trouble with Discover's CS, but do you realize that since your app'd, it's on your records now, whether open or closed? You might want to go ahead and accept it after all. It's going to stay on your reports for another ten years.

If Discover only pulled your TU, and if AmEx only pulls your EX, then AmEx might not know about the Discover. Typically, though, for those with short histories, multiple reports get pulled, so AmEx will probably see that you tried.

As to your Visa, it's great that you PIF it, but if the balance owed shows on the statement, it's getting reported to the credit bureaus, making it look like you carry balances. This is why many of us pay off our cards several days before the statement is due, so that they will report $0.

But with scores in the 740's, it must not be hurting you much --just an FYI.

[Anonymous]

one suggestion I would have to get out of the student card trap is to do a card conversion. I was able to convert my Blue for Students to an Amex Clear after two years of use and moderate usage each month. I even was carrying a balance at the time of my request ($1400 on a $3800 CL) and they did it for me. I assume this new Clear card will not be subject to any of the student rules, or at least I hope!

Secondly, I applied for another card, the inNYC card. I hear these cards are reasonably easy to get even with lower incomes. I got a $5000 CL instant approval. They no longer offer these but they seem to be like regular Blue (which even students can get). In fact, they're converting mine to a regular blue in a few months as they phase out the program.

[Anonymous]

also, you should definitely re-open that Discover card. just say it was a mistake and you didn't mean to, you were confused as to what closing it would do. Discover is a great company to do business with, from what I've heard, and that was probably just one bad CS rep.

when I got the "verify yourself" with Amex I did it in a second, because I knew Amex was a company you wanted to be in with and I felt like I had nothing to lose since I did have a legitimate home address which could be verified by a bank (Amex even called BoA and got them on the line to confirm my address without me even doing anything but staying on the line).

also, I originally closed a Chase account because they weren't giving me as good terms as I wanted on my card. fortunately I came upon this forum about four days later and discovered that closing my only, and fairly large (with consistently low util) TL in good standing with chase was a bad idea - i should just let it grow with my credit history and put a sandwich on it every once and a while, or just make it my morning coffee card.

[Anonymous]

I tried to log back in to respond to the thread, but I guess my account didn't get created properly or something?! LOL...anyway...this is the OP... I got approved!!! I did have to call in to verify my address, (done with a call to my bank) but was approved for a decent APR and a generous CL (better than Discover's offered CL). Regardless, you guys made good points concerning the inquiry already being active from Discover....I probably should just reopen it. The AMEX representatives were so nice and helpful, the Discover people just seemed to want to pepper me with sales pitches. Does anyone know if Discover will recheck my credit if I attempt to reopen the account?

[Anonymous]

Doubtful they will re-check if you can answer the ID questions correctly.

Welcome to the Amex famillly-

[Anonymous]

Discover CS is just a good as AMEX-

I have been thrilled with both. I hope you give them both a chance to grow with you.  

[athensguy]

The last couple of times I've called Discover they've done the silly credit protector spiel, which of course I desperately need for my $0 revolving balance Discover...