You really should just go ahead and call American Express and tell them you would like a reconsideration, the reason doesn't make sense - a denial for a charge card due to a FICO score of 698 goes pretty far against their grain.    Some people will tell you an AMEX recon is rarely successful,  all I can say is that I haven't seen a lot of actual data points for either successes or failures and I know from experience a successful recon can be done while you're on the phone with the analyst.  ... View more

@SpaceCityCCuser wrote: I want to app the Marriott Boundless to PC it next year to a Ritz Carlton to keep my insurance coverages (nearly same as CSR) via card and lounge access. Since you opened an AMEX Bonvoy Business card in March 2024 you're well past the autodenial window for the Boundless but I believe you still won't be eligible for a SUB offer until next April, you'll need to fact check me on that.  ... View more

@Yawgoog wrote: ‘Big Balls’ in Biggest Ever Social Security Leak: Whistleblower (August 26) https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/big-balls-biggest-ever-social-172516854.html   Low quality ragebait article.     If placing Restricted or Compartmented data in a public cloud was inherently reckless with the data inherently made vulnerable a lot of FDIC and NCUA member institutions and the cybersecurity companies with regulatory approval to provide them services would be in a world of deep doodoo, never mind the business impact to AWS and Azure.  ... View more

@Thomas_Thumb wrote: I believe the fraud alerts remain active for 5 years. So far no fraudulent accounts opened in my name.  A standard fraud alert remains in place for 1 year.  If you have evidence of being a fraud victim (like a a police report) or identity theft you can place an extended alert which will remain active for 7 years.  ... View more

@idunnomypassword1231 wrote: annual fee charges don't fulfill any part of the spend requirement, right? Thanks. Correct.  ... View more

  Here ya go.    https://ficoforums.myfico.com/t5/Credit-Cards/I-m-just-loving-this-SYW-card-10-CB-gas-dining-grocery-Q1-23/m-p/6831434/highlight/true#M1888718 ... View more

As I understand it at least for now there's no such restriction,  you can get approved for both cards and be eligible for both bonuses.  ... View more

@FicoMike0 wrote: I never heard of Deserve or Celtic Bank before. I went to a movie at amc recently, reminded me I don't like them. If there's a Marcus cinema near you, try them, much nicer.  Celtic Bank is mostly known for playing in the subprime CC arena along with the likes of Credit One and Merrick,  Deserve was one of the fintech startups much like Cardless whose business model was tied to marketing/managing co-branded cards by partnering with a bank who serves as the actual issuer. ... View more

First I've heard of it.  Doesn't mean the rep was wrong though.    Chase has for a while allowed limit transfers from donor cards such that the remaining limit is below the minimum threshold needed for initial approval (e.g. you can transfer CL from a CSR so the remining CL is below $10K) so allowing such a PC wouldn't necessarily be waaaay out of line.  Could be they've updated their policy as an incentive to upgrade, I guess we won't know until we have a data point of a success.  ... View more

@CreditCuriosity wrote: Honestly not a surprise to me.  These type of cards don't typically last long especially on such a niche type of card in my honest opinion. In this particular case the fintech fronting the card (Deserve - Celtic Bank was the actual backend issuer) was acquired by Intuit earlier this year. The Deserve-branded cards are also going/gone, and the AMC portfolio must have been too small to be worth anyone else taking over.    Can only speculate on how the acquisition will be assimilated into the Credit Karma portfolio.   ... View more

@bs1234 wrote: @Kforce wrote: Good thing none of us jumped on it first thing. Strange all the people who called, chatted or stopped in to a branch were told 5x last week. Showe's the CS and employees just read the same web page as we do.  I assume a non-zero people actually applied and got the card under the impression they were getting 5%.  I suspect no redress if the T&Cs were correct (as there is usually language that that is the entire contract) and also rewards can change at any time... A change from 5% to 3% cashback should be considered as a change adversely affecting members and being a state-chartered CU doesn't automatically absolve the CU  from being bound by  US TItle 12 regulations (the term 'credit union' specifically includes those with state charters) so they may have to give at least 30 days notice of such a rewards change.     ... View more

You mention a dispute, are any of your reports currently showing a dispute is in progress?  If needed go to annualcreditreport.com and pull fresh copies.  ... View more

The point at which you're no longer on their naughty list is a big YMMV.  Worst case is up to 12 months from the time of the missed payment.          ... View more

@TrapLine wrote: Good information.   Going back in time, Sage Stream was a separate reporting unit. Until this post (haven't requested updated report copies), I did not know they were linked. Yes - they were acquired by Lexis Nexis 3-4 years ago but they still maintain their function as a secondary CRA independent of the legacy data mining/data consolidation/insurance/identity verification reporting services.    One of the ways relevant to us that continues to manifest itself is that freezing and thawing of ones Sagestream credit report remains completely independent of freezing and thawing of ones Lexis Nexis consumer report.  ... View more

I'd suggest you go ahead and apply and if you are either denied or approved with a toy limit recon the decision and be willing to offer to transfer limit from one of your current cards over to support an approval/higher limit.    Chase will allow limit to be reallocated from personal to business cards,  it's business-to-personal they won't move.  ... View more

@madmann26 wrote: @coldfusion wrote: Did you go through a recent cycle of successful CLI requests?   Sure did. There's your likely answer.  That's a known trigger even if the cardholder has a pristine history.  ... View more

Did you go through a recent cycle of successful CLI requests?   ... View more

@sjt wrote: Approved for $26.4K (disappointed with the CL). Congrats on the approval - that's actually a pretty high starting limit for a Bank of America card, they're more apt to issue cards with middling starting limits and make up for it in CLIs.   ... View more

You can't product change the IHG or the United card over to a card in a different family so if they no longer serve a useful purpose you might as well just transfer their limits over to the Freedom Flex and close them.      There shouldn't be any negative impact to your scoring.    Expect that you will need to leave $500 in credit limit behind on each of these cards i.e.  they will allow you to transfer over $3500 from the IHG card and $5500 from the Gateway onto the Freedom Flex.     Be sure to clearly explain that you want to transfer the limit over and then close the card out,  the CSR can process that in 2 discrete steps back to back for each card while you're on the phone.  ... View more

@dfwxjer wrote: @CaneVariant wrote: The best short cut might be having a "look-alike" built. I met a guy from LA who had a watch made to look like a pepsi submariner. Obviously not OEM but a really nice replica. He said it cost around ~$2k. This was pre-pandemic so who knows what happened to the price. Ehhhhh not the same thing. Not to say one can't get a quality knock-off, but ethics come in to play, not to mention it won't hold it's value.  Given the way they phrased their comment about the watch obviously not being real it sounds more to me like they used the 'replica' term in a casual sense, not meant in a way that an amateur horologist would literally interpret it.  ... View more

@CaneVariant wrote: The best short cut might be having a "look-alike" built. I met a guy from LA who had a watch made to look like a pepsi submariner. Obviously not OEM but a really nice replica. He said it cost around ~$2k. This was pre-pandemic so who knows what happened to the price.   2-tone bezels like a Pepsi (blue/red), Coke (black/red), or Batman (black/blue) etc are more commonly associated with a GMT Master or homage but as long as you can get a bezel that properly fits they can be pretty easy to swap out.    No shortage of nice homage GMT or Submariner style watches with Swiss automatic movements to be had for under $2K although watch prices have jumped quite a bit over the last several years.      ... View more

@AndrewF wrote: @Patient957 wrote: @AndrewF wrote: https://finance.yahoo.com/news/rolex-luxury-watchmakers-brace-for-trumps-tariffs-on-swiss-imports-181704258.html   According to Yahoo Finance, although it doesn't specifically say this, it is now cheaper to take a vacation to Switzerland and buy a Rolex than it is to buy a Rolex, due to tariffs.   According to the article, the tariffs could raise the price of even a Rolex Submariner by $4,000. That means that by the time you're in the upper end of the Rolex offerings, you save enough to buy a $40,000 car by getting on a plane to Switzerland to buy the watch.   Strange times. Of course, you'd have to declare that watch to U.S. Customs upon your return the U.S.  I think the duty free exemption is like $800, so I don't think that Rolex would qualify.   So unless you want to be a jewelry smuggler, you'd have to declare the watch, show receipts, and pay duties.  Whether you'd still come out on top, idk, but it might not be worth it after all. If it's one watch for personal use and you're wearing it, it's personal effects. If you fail to declare 100 of them then they're going to be mad. Doesn't quite work that way.  US Customs is wise to most of the games people try to play in order to avoid paying customs fees on luxury watches purchased overseas and it also helps their cause that a Rolex' resale value is adversely impacted by not having its full kit* i.e. you legitimately risk playing yourself by leaving the box and papers behind or trying to ship them to yourself in the US.    * full kit means box, papers, Rolex warranty card, all bracelet links, etc.   Even failure to have the Rolex warranty card in itself is meaningful to the valuation.    I don't think there are too many fully authentic non-Frankenwatch Rolex watches other than maybe a rare vintage collectable or one  heavily modified by a known and reputable 3rd party where one would likely save $40K by traveling outside the US to buy an example. ... View more

You only need 1 active installment loan to be able to get a scoring benefit, and a PenFed SSL checks off all of  the relevant and mportant boxes.    The key to maximizing the scoring benefit of the loan is to immediately pay off enough of the installments to drop the remaining balance of the SSL below approx. 8.9% of the loan amount.   PenFed does not revise the due dates of later payments if previous payments against the SSL are made early  (NFCU follows the same practice) which is a big reason why its SSL is so often suggested as not all issuers of SSL do this.      The loan would report to all 3 CRAs.  ... View more

I just checked for giggles and the prequal feature looks to be back up.  ... View more

Did you apply online while traveling, using a VPN, or a satellite internet provider (Starlink/Viasat)?   Get a free copy of your Transuion report at annualcreditreport.com to confirm its current content.  It's possible that Chase placed a fraud alert on your report (and if so Transunion should have alerted Experian and Equifax so you'll want to confirm status of those reports as well) but those are straightforward to remove, often with just a phone call and the inquiry should have been withdrawn without any residual artifact on your report.    edited:  forgot to mention that you should also get a copy of your LexisNexis consumer disclosure report;  it's probably clean given your 4 other recent approvals but it's worth taking a look at for completeness.  https://consumer.risk.lexisnexis.com/request ... View more