Legit message, but it's only a targeted marketing effort based on your having a Mileage Plus number and passing a very basic screening, it is not a preapproval.   Since the card is underwritten by Chase your having several new accounts would reduce your odds of approval and if you've had more than 4 new accounts in the last 24 months the odds of approval are extremely poor due to their 5/24 rule. ... View more

Could be an error in how they are reporting,  could be that their current policy is to not report if the account is in good standing but that should be easy enough to establish and if needed to resolve with a phone call.  There is no legal requirement for them to report,  only that if they choose to report that they report accurately. ... View more

@jackhughes wrote: Is there any possible negatives of me contacting them or any problems that could occur because i reply heavily on that card on a daily basis and dont want like my card to be reissued or something similar.  If you're talking about your own Freedom Unlimited no,  you aren't disputing any transactions or having issues with payment,  only that for some reason Chase stopped reporting.    Technically they are not legally required to report but it is their policy to do so and if they aren't it's fair to bring it to their attention.  ... View more

New offer via USPS today:   "Earn 7,500 bonus ThankYou Points when you make eligible purchases totaling $1,500 or more with your Citi ThankYou Mastercard (previously Sears Mastercard) between 5/1/2025 (or the date you activate this offer, whichever is later) through 5/31/2025".   Other than the usual boilerplate restrictions this is non-category spend.   The 5% back isn't earth-shattering but I can stack the majority of that threshold with spend against the gas/groceries/restaurant promo, will have to think about the home improvement promo for this month or other best options. ... View more

Your Chase Freedom Unlimited card no longer reporting is most likely due to an error made on their end, since Chase is normally a reliable reporter and all 3 CRAs were affected at the same time.    IMO you should try contacting them directly ( https://www.chase.com/digital/resources/complaints-feedback ) to complain that they haven't updated the information with any of the credit reporting agencies since last July, once they confirm that they are (now) reporting correctly wait 30 days and if a report hasn't been updated file a dispute with the relevant CRA due to incorrect reporting. ... View more

@okurosetta wrote: @Xanthos472 wrote: Received via snail mail on Monday:     Get 175,000 points per month with home improvement spend of $1K; each month, for 3 months. Expires 7-31-25. Stacks with the $100 statement credit/$1K online offer I currently have 🤑 I have somewhat similar offers, except different amounts, $10-20 statement credit after $100-200 home improvement spend and $75 statement credit after $750 online spend. Still very new to SYW - would orders through the Home Depot website count for both? It should.  The transaction from an order placed online even if ordered for in-store pickup will show as from homedepot.com vs in store as from The Home Depot but they both code the transaction type  as "Merchandise - HOME SUPPLY WAREHOUSE STORES".  ... View more

@Realist wrote: Makes me wonder now.   They sent me a preapproved 50k offer, and a free year of Amazon sub.  I think the 50k offer is valued at $500 bucks.  Still not yet sold on it.  I like cash valuation no doubt, but I highly like hotel valuations.  It seems, not enough, but I'll look.     Points redeemed for travel in the portal are valued the same as for cashback - a penny a point. ... View more

@NoMoreE46 wrote: @coldfusion wrote: @NoMoreE46 wrote:   Try  a CLI on the HD card which maybe especially handy now.   Just so that they understand that a CLI request on the Home Depot card will cost them an inquiry. Ooh my bad- thanks.  I thought HD would be a SP from Citi.   It's a mixed bag with cards issued through Citi Retail Services.  Some Retail Services cards like the ThankYou/SYW (former Sears Mastercards) and the DNSB (Macy's/Bloomingdale's) cards use soft pull CLIs  but others including the HD cards use hard pulls. ... View more

@NoMoreE46 wrote:   Try  a CLI on the HD card which maybe especially handy now.   Just so that they understand that a CLI request on the Home Depot card will cost them an inquiry. ... View more

You might find this thread useful as it's based on crowdsourced data and takes into account that some issuers base which CRA that they pull from on which state you live in.    https://ficoforums.myfico.com/t5/General-Credit-Topics/Which-Report-Will-They-Pull-Part-2/td-p/6379773   In any case you need to be mindful that the established conventions are not 100% foolproof;  to  give a couple of examples Chase and Citi are known to occasionally double-pull from both Experian and someone else and BoA will (rarely, but it does happen) instead hard pull from a different CRA.     ... View more

@Lurker22 wrote: I checked carefully, no min spend amount, only says 2 or more transactions (so I did 2 $10 transactions with my electric co)  The promo runs from May 1 - June 30.   Oops.     ... View more

@Bockrocker wrote: The thread is almost onto the third page!  We been slacking!   Anyway I received another 3 months of 10% home improvement up to $100.  Via snail mail.  I wish there was a great way to use it but none of the hardware stores sell good gift cards unless you have a big Amazon purchase coming up.   Lowes: $200 Max Visa/MC with $7.95 fee. Still sorta worth it if you paying bills with no card fees ($185.08 cost with 11% back).  $500 daily limit (ymmv) Home Depot: $200 max Visa/MC with 7.95 fee.  Unsure about any limit. Ace Hardware: I thought I might have found a solution with Ace.  On their website they list a $500 Visa card with $6.95 fee but I went into a store and they didn't know anything about it.  Evidently online only.  And worse yet, it's sold through acehardware.thegiftcardshop.com so there's no portal cashback and it doesn't even code as a hardware store. (Codes as n/a on Citi site).   I got the equivalent TYP-based offer today via USPS,  10X bonus + 1 TYP/$  on $800 min/$1000 max spend per month at home improvement stores for May-July. ... View more

Insofar as there being a big-picture long term benefit to credit scoring, not really.    If you don't have the time, energy,  or motivation to regularly keep track of 17 different open tradelines and make sure that every one of them sees some spend  at least every now and then - everyone has their own limit and there is no shortage of people who think that 17 is way more than they can or want to deal with -  then it can be worth it to thin out the herd if for no other reason than your own peace of mind.     I myself would not close a number of accounts all at once but instead would stagger the closures over a period of time. ... View more

@NoMoreE46 wrote: Is this 1 cpp?  Yes if redeeming for cashback, gift cards, or travel through their travel portal,  not sure for event tickets ,if directly for merchandise from what little I've seen expect < 1 cpp. ... View more

@UncleB wrote: I was sure to note that the email mentioned my card as a Flagship (along with the last four digits of the #) since my PC was relatively recent.  This will cover the Flagship $49 AF, and the leftover dollars will just about exactly cover the sales tax on Prime (which is not covered by the benefit).   Can confirm that the card still covers the cost for the yearly Prime subscription (took them 5 calendar days for the offsetting Rewards from NFCU transaction to post after the Amazon charge), but I wasn't charged any MA sales tax.  ... View more

  It's a sliding window.  You'd only have to wait another 8 days after the 3rd application to technically be eligible to apply for card #4. ... View more

@unsungivy wrote: I wasn't aware there was a too-many-too-soon rule I'm guessing they're referencing the old BoA 2/3/4 rule that IIRC they put that in place right around the time they killed off the Merrill+ card and which their 7/12 rule would align with.  The 7/12 rule applies to cards from all issuers, whereas the 2/3/4 rule is basically that you can get 2 BoA cards in a month  (7/12 rule would apply once you get that 1st approval even if you weren't previously a BoA client), 3 BoA cards in a 12 month rolling window,  4 BoA cards in 24 months.  Never heard before that affnity cards were exempted from that rule,  am not aware of any cards not on that list. ... View more

@linlinyidan  they'll consider going over the $99.9K threshold if they see you as a high-value client or show significant potential of transitioning to becoming a high-value client.   it can be done by someone with PH status and checking account with regular monthly activity both inbound and outbound but odds are better if ones combined BoA/Merrill portfolio is on the order of several hundred K $,  I've known of members here in the past who have had an aggregate BoA CL in the $150-200K range, I'm not quite at that level.   Your experience with the limit reallocation is not unique, they've become  pretty well-known for at times unilaterally and silently reallocating limit from an existing card to approve an application for a new one.   ... View more

@ptatohed wrote: I don't think I have ever read about someone applying for a card, just to transfer its full CL to another card, and then close it.  What was the thought process here?    Taking the gamble that the SL on a new card would be bigger than a CLI on an existing one would be my guess.   TBH Idon't think that's a bad gamble but if this becomes a practice at a scale which Chase considers a critical mass of abuse I could see them taking steps to curtail it like becoming selective on how much limit on a newish card can be reallocated out. ... View more

A blacklisting or direct AA against your open account would be a surprise but your odds of getting limit increases and/or another card from Chase are going to be diminished for a while.   ... View more

We've had multiple members be successful at this game over the last several years,  here's hoping you get to become one them. ... View more

@PullingMeSoftly wrote: @coldfusion wrote: After each or either approval did they come back with an offer to consider a larger CLI if you agreed to a hard pull? (congrats BTW!) Thanks @coldfusion, no option given to go for more with an HP (on either card) Thanks for passing that along,  that's a data point validating a process change that I had heard about thirdhand.    Used to be that they would do that, without risk to you losing any or all of that SP CLI, if you declined the offer or if you accepted it and didn't get an additional increase. ... View more

Sounds like their pendulum really has swung back hard toward their days when a common reason for a deniial was due to pyramiding debt and a 5-figure starting limit was almost a miracle. ... View more

@EasyMark wrote: So, coldfusion (another holy grail!), it sounds like you've heard that the old Sears/SYW TYP variant will retain its SYW-like offers, even if shorn of the SYW monker and retaining the ThankYouMastercard TYP compensation - did I understand you right? (If so, I'm surprised - why did they bother, then?) Sorry for the misimplication - I did not mean PCing from the precious SYW card now, but rather from some other wretched Citi card variant into the new ThankYou Mastercard, if the compensation terms of cashback were lucrative enough. I'll know for sure if that's the case if/when I receive a new monthly or quarterly offer,  my last quarterly offer went through February but I was one of the cardholders who last month (i.e. after the changeover and  the transition roadmap had been socialized) got the TYP variant of the 10% gas/grocery/restaurant offer through the end of 2025 (basically up to a net 11x TYP per dollar spend).   No idea about Citi's plans to allow a PC to the ThankYou Mastercard.  A PC from a wretched Citi card whether core or co-branded wouldn't be a completely straightforward internal process within Citi as it isn't a core card, like the SYW card it's managed and maintained through Citi Retail Services. ... View more

@IcyCool7227 wrote: Then for existing cardholders like me, do they still honor lost and stolen card inquiries giving out new cards? What about CLIs? I've never had a card that was dc'd to new applicants like the Rewards Plus. I cringe contacting Citi support about anything and would rather ask here. Basically, when this happens everything continues to operate as normal until the card product is fully dc'd/sunsetted correct? Yes to replacing lost/stolen cards,  yes to CLIs,  yes to operating as normal until they decide to either PC the entire portfolio to a different card or close it out altogether.  That includes automatically sending out replacement cards when the existing one's expiration date approaches.   A similar example is the Barclay Arrival+ which has been closed to new applications for several years that they still service.       ... View more

Congrats on the approval, and yes $5K is the minimum starting limit on this card.   You already have other travel-focused cards in the Venture X and NFCU Flagship so yep it would be pretty redundant, but you could use it as a backup or as an alternate to your Venture X for car rentals as it also provides primary CDW coverage.    The 100,000 UR SUB isn't bad either ;-) ... View more

@bs1234 wrote: @sjt wrote: Definition of MS from Google: Manufacturing spending, in the context of credit cards, refers to strategies used to meet minimum spending requirements for rewards, bonuses, or other incentives. It involves "spending" money on items that will be readily convertible back to cash or usable funds, essentially creating the illusion of spending without a real monetary outflow. A common example is buying gift cards, which are then used to make purchases That seems too narrow, suggesting it is used to meet minimum spend for SUBS.   A lot of MS is just to continue to generate rewards, long after any SUB is met.   And using the gift cards to make purchases isn't going to work very well! You're correct that it is too narrow a description, but using gift cards was a pretty successful trick until card issuers started flagging gift card purchases as being ineligible for rewards and merchants like the USPS and Walmart put in policies that prevented accepting them for certain types of transactions.   As already mentioned upthread what OP is doing isn't manufactured spend and they shouldn't have any issues with AMEX. ... View more

@FlaDude wrote: I wouldn't worry too much about the initial score change since utilization has no memory (ignoring FICO 10 score), but if you make a large payment before the first statement cuts, I would expect it to report utilization accordingly.   There is a smallish score penalty for having no open installment loans, since you've taken the hit of opening a new account and corresponding inquiry, I'd try to keep it open until the mortgage process. You might want to call to see paying a large sum will be credited as having made future payments, or if you still need to pay the minimum monthly going forward. My hunch would be the latter, but as @coldfusion said, not all institutions are the same. You might want to pay just 70-80% now if that allows you to keep the loan open longer, you can always make a significant payment later to get utilization where you want it right before you get into the mortgage process. That's basically what I was driving at, by immediately making payments against the most recent installments if the due dates for the later installments remain unchanged there should be a boost in scores as soon as the updated remaining balance of the loan is reported.   Having prepayments pulling in the due dates for remaining installments wouldn't be a dealbreaker but would require more finesse and paying attention to timing when getting close to applying for the mortgage, as you wanted to ensure that the loan were paid down and updated balance reported before you submitted your mortgage application(s) without having the loan be closed.       The reason for confirming there were no other installment loans is that the FICO no-installment-loan penalty (~10-20 points is common) is negated if there is a single installment loan open.  From a scoring perspective there is no additional benefit by having more than 1  open installment loan. ... View more

Expect to take an initial hit of somewhere around 30-40 points in your FICO8 scores due to the new installment loan reporting at 100% utilization, your other FICO scores will dip as well.    If you treated this as a normal installment loan your scores would organically start to recover in a few months as the loan ages a bit and as you reach certain thresholds as the utilization percentage drops.   You may or may not completely recover your scores back to what they were before you submitted the loan application in around 12-18 months.    As to whether or not you can accelerate the recovery of your scores and how much you can recover in a shorter time (or even end up boosting them)  there are 2 starter questions to be asked up front:   1)  Is this your only open installment loan?   (credit cards are not considered installment loans) 2) If you prepay an installment does the original due date for each of the remaining installments remain unchanged or are they pulled in e.g. if you pay your May and June installments does the installment now due in July remain as being due in July or would that payment now become due in May?   Some banks and credit unions allow the original due date of subsequent installments to remain,  others pull them in so that the cadence of paying an installment each month remains unbroken.       ... View more