So. After seeing the success people have been having lately with Capital One, and emboldened by my recent AMEX 3X CLI, plus knowing that Capital One had soft-pulled me on EX in December and January, I called them. Not the Executive Office, but I didn't want to waste their time and I figured I'd just ask about seeing if they would FINALLY give me a CLI. The CSR was very nice, and she was very clear that they'd only do a soft pull and that they've been doing less stuff along these lines lately because they've been busy with their purchase of HSBC. DENIED. No CLI, and I'll get my "how come" letter. When they do a soft pull, does the letter include a score? I don't think I'll bother with a recon, and that card is going in the drawer for real. Also, since T-Mobile is asking me to update my card info (I just got a new one cause the old one expired), I'm going to shift that autopayment to another card. May as well get cash back from Discover or AMEX instead.
Any thoughts? Is it possible to PC a rebuilder Capital One? If I decide (after my refi) to apply for another Capital One card, is it possible that I can combine them and keep the history instead of closing it and having my oldest card fall off in 10 years?
Starting Score: EQ 583 TU04 619 EX 592 (lender pull) 2010
My "denial" letter did not include a score because they did not use a bureau to determine my eligibility. They said their policies do not allow customer initiated CLI, so they didn't pull a report and didn't provide a score.
Contact the EO and tell them what you want!
Go through the Exec office.
Its a much different attitude and service level. Like night and day different. 
Oh, her *attitude* was absolutely not a problem. She was very sympathetic. She just didn't have the ability to do anything about it, including tell me why.
I guess I could bother with the EO. Really, if it weren't my oldest card, I would think about closing it. It's got a $500 limit. I don't have any 5-figure cards, but every single other one is a 4-figure card. If you exclude my sucky Target Visa, the other 5 range from $4300 to $8300.
She even brought up balance transfer offers I should check on eligibility for. I said "that's all well and good, but my lowest rate is 9% - why would I ever transfer a balance to a card with a 23% interest rate?"
Eh. I'm going to wait for my statements to cut to do anything else. I paid down from over 50% utilization to under 25%. Well, it would have been OVER 25% except that AMEX CLI made the difference.
If I remember right, it should stay on your report and contribute to AAoA for 10 years after you close it. I've got a long-closed HSBC, last activity in 2004, that is dropping off my reports in August 2014. Also, you have the option of calling and asking them to re-open if you really want to.