AMEX Optima Oasis

[Anonymous]

I’ve had a similar experience to some others here. Paid off an Amex CO recently. Experian dropped 39 points but Vantage score on AmEx site went up 12 points so I don’t know what to think. I was offered the Oasis card but told them I wasn’t interested. I have no use for a $500 limit card at this point. I’ll keep applying every couple months to see if I’m off the blacklist yet.

[Anonymous]

Hi,

 What was your credit score at the time of the hard inquiry?

[Brian_Earl_Spilner]

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@Anonymous wrote:
I’ve had a similar experience to some others here. Paid off an Amex CO recently. Experian dropped 39 points but Vantage score on AmEx site went up 12 points so I don’t know what to think. I was offered the Oasis card but told them I wasn’t interested. I have no use for a $500 limit card at this point. I’ll keep applying every couple months to see if I’m off the blacklist yet.

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Please keep us updated. I'm curious if you get approved as the Oasis sets a 12 month timeline before you can be approved for normal lines.

[Anonymous]

Another update: my 50 point score tank has recovered +30 within a month of initial tank with no signifant balance change reported on my cards. Strange.

Also, it took 2 months for the new tradeline to show. Approved for new card on 8/6 and reported on 9/29. New card tradeline had no impact on score. The old paid tradeline is still there and reporting as “paid after chargeoff”.

Although this isn’t a rewards card, I’ve still made $10 with an Amex promotion by paying a utility with the card (AT&T). Not too shabby. I won’t use it as an everyday card because of the low credit line, but for random promos like this it’s worth the effort to use Amex.

[sjt]

FYI- Once you pay Amex off, you will no longer be on the "blacklist". However, you would still be subject to general credit approval.

[sjt]

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@Anonymous wrote:
For me, it tanked my score by 50 points. (720 to 670). They changed the tradeline from “charge off” with a balance owed to “paid, previously a charge off” with a zero balance. The balance I paid was removed from my total debt but didn’t improve my utilization score because it was already low. I suppose the brand new “paid, previously a charge off” update was way more negative than the 5 year old charge off status. My new Amex tradeline hasn’t appeared on my reports yet, but I assume it will have little impact or may pull my score lower by reducing average age of accounts.

However, paying it was the right thing to do. The negative tradeline will (hopefully?) still fall off the report in 2 years. I have my fingers crossed that “paid, previously a charge off” update from 2018 doesn’t stay put for another 7 years. If it does, I should be able to safely dispute that with the CR.

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Thats really odd. Once you pay the charge off it zeros it out and stops monthly reporting of the charge off. You should have received a score bump. Was the score a FICO score?

You dont have to worry about another 7 years as the 7 year deletion date is always the DOFD whic never changes.

[Anonymous]

That’s what you’d think. It was Vantage score, so maybe they have a blip in thier scoring algorithm that can’t resolve that. I don’t check FICOs regularly but FICo before and after seem pretty stable - in other words, I can’t tell that it had an impact whatsoever.

[sjt]

Dont pay attention to the Vantage score. Even with that score you should received a bump though.

One of the good things about having an Amex is that you get a free Experian FICO score thats frequently updated.

[Anonymous]

I received my Optima offer letter from the collection agency today. It was a surprise. Glad I found this forum. Thank you for information and feedback by members.

[Anonymous]

Congrats on your application. Odd question: do you have the address on the return envelope? I misplaced my return envelope, and to my suprise, I haven't been able to get the correct address from Amex--I used one of the addresses they gave me, and the app was returned.