pasq said: I have a $7600 balance on the card. The card was opened in 2006 15 month 0% deal. After the intro rate was over I left the balance being happy with 7.95% business financing..Thats exactly what the cc companies hope you will do. CC companies dont want you to payoff balances when the promo rate expires, they want to earn as much as they can on you after the intro promo, and thats why they raised the rate. You should never pay interest when you dont have to.

After you move the balance from Advanta, thats when they will entice you to bring your balance back with a new promo offer

Love said:I performed Mini AOR in Jan 08. After AOR I have total 14 cards (4 cards for about 7-8 yrs + 10 new cards)
My total credit line after AOR is about 160K. I am using 100K out of it.

I recently received a letter from Chase on 2 of my account saying that after careful consideration, they have decreased my credit line for:

- Balance owed on revolving accounts too high
- Too little available credit on accounts

Is there any thing I can do?

One of the chase card is with me for couple of yrs with credit line of 6.5K. During AOR I got chase card with credit line of 21K.

I have not been using chase card with 6.5K limit after I got new chase card as it has 1% Cash Back and 0% APR on all purchases.

21K got reduced to 13.5K
6.5K got reduced to 2.5K

Anything I can do? I have been following and reading AOR threads. I am surprised how this happen to me?

Any suggestions?

My AOR has experienced no adverse action and even credit increases on US Bank, National City and Bank Atlantic cards to the tune of over 10K.

My wife's AOR is a different story. We have the same credit BUT whe was an authorized user on all of our daily spenders. We maxed out almost all of our available BT offers on both sides, but Chase, Advante, and Discover lowered her lines because of High Utilization. Net loss of 6K in lines not worth fighting over. National City did increase her line by 1.5K. She also receives a ton of sub prime junk mail.

It's amazing with the backgrounds and results being so similar that there is much difference in the reviews. It must be her short credit card as the financially responsible person of record.

cheaprulz said:....

Is it worth trying an Ap-O-Rama ?

What are you expecting from an AOR?

A) bragging rights
B) lower credit score
C) free money from interest
D) signup bonuses
E) all of the above

cheaprulz said:Hi All.

I am thinking of doing an App-O-Rama -- but My income has dropped to 2/3 of what it was previously --
With a credit score of 724 when I try for a credit line increase the response is that:
I have enough credit for my income.

Is it worth trying an Ap-O-Rama ?Just avoid the issuer who is telling you that you have enough credit with them.

Although most will allow you to reallocate to a new card, so you can use your existing limit with a new promo offer.

And sometimes new apps are treated differently from a maximum-limit perspective than CLIs on existing accounts.

So sure, go for it. But your credit score is meaningless without the context of your credit report data and income level; no one knows if its 'worth it' without all that info.

And FYI, in response to your other comment - yes, your credit score will drop rather significantly post-A0R. But as time goes by, your score will rebound (potentially higher than when you started).

leashy said:I am totally new at this, so i need some help. I am thinking about doing an A0R, but I have some questions before I go applying.

1) Has anyone done a A0R with a low HHI income? Our HHI is around $35,000-$40,000. Is that going to get me a bunch of low balance cards? However, I do have a great credit score of 800.

2) After I am approved, how do I get the money to deposit it into the checking account? Is this what everyone is calling a BT? So do i just call and request a check from the CC company?

3) This question may seem really stupid, but...If i sign up for a checking account from a bank that is not local, how do I get them the money to put into the account? (Wire it?) And how do I receive the money when I want to close the account after 1 yr?

4) Where are the cards with 0% APR on BTs and no BT fees? All I can find are cards with $75 or $99 cap on BT fees. Looks like BOA and Citi cards have no cap on their 3% BT fee. So those are not even an option. If I were to get approved for say…4 Chase cards for $5000 each, would they allow me to consolidate those into one $20,000 card? Or would it be a better idea to just try to get a big CLI? I would be happy if I could just get a few $20,000 cards that I could take $15,000 from each to put into a 5% rewards checking account.

1. I think the credit score is what counts
2. many of them give you checks. There is a thread on this site about ways to to do it. keep looking.
3. you can send them the check via us mail or electronically transfer it from your local bank (not wire, ACH). To receive just ask the bank for a withdrawel.
4. again, there are threads here and look for peoples AOR threads. But the free BT are hard to find. you might count on 5-10k credit limit per approved card and estimate how mnay cards to apply for that way.

billkong said:Just got walloped with A/A from American Express. Went from having 5 cards with them, total credit line around $75k, no balances, to having 5 cards, total credit line $2500. Have been diligently paying down my AOR I did last November, and they just now hit me with this. Unfortunate, because the AMEX Card was my daily card.

Total credit available prior to this: $250k
HHI: $150k
Debt on cards: $44k
Highest percentage on a card: 75% (personal)


Guess AMEX loses my business forever. A $2500 credit line, sure, I understand, but $500? No thanks. It's odd that they just recently did this, though.
That is quite an AA! You might post this to List Credit Card Issuers that closed accounts....due to usage patterns . This a very troubling trend that at some point may necessitate a reevaluation of AOR strategies and approaches I think. I'd be interested in other details you are comfortable sharing (e.g. FICO, overall utilization, any recent usage changes besides your AOR last Fall, etc, etc).

billkong said:FICO before: 79x
FICO immediately after AOR: 72x
FICO now: 75x

Overall utilization: 44k / 250k = ~20%

No increased usage at all. I use my AMEX card as my daily spender, but don't put any more than $1500 a month through, which I always promptly pay off. I've never missed a payment in 9+ years of having a credit record.

Before the AOR, didn't do anything out of the ordinary. Strikes me as quite odd that they A/Aed me this late in the game.

A few questions:

-- Do you live in a state where real estate values have taken a dive (Calif, Fla, etc?)
-- Do you have a large mortgage and/or HEL/HELOC and or car loan(s)?
-- Churned a lot of cards with AMEX?
-- Reallocated credit limits with AMEX?
-- Sounds like you have no current balance with AMEX. Did you ever do a large BT at 0% with them?

And finally,

Are you planning to call and try to talk them out of this? I hope you do. It seems unreasonable, and I would be interested to hear what they tell you.

Best wishes, and very sorry that this happened to you.
Vance

borednewb said:Do not use American Express transfer checks. I talk to the person on the phone and asked if it was OK to write someone a check and get 0% APR. She said yes. Lo and behold now I am stuck with high APR. I called AMEX and they will not honor their own salespeople word. I have been an AMEX customer for over 5+ years with no problems and they are going to lose me because of this!

Was it a new card with a 0% promotion and whom did you write it to? I just wrote a BT check for a new account and it has posted as "BT Convenience Check" and I' m a little nervous about the rate.

I did a small AOR myself last year after the purchase of our house, and paid off my heloc. It's Time to pay off my cards and HELOC again

Wife's AOR 2.0 6/30/08
Name: Tim1's Wife
FICO and/or FAKO : 760-780
HouseHold Income: 79,000
Reported Utilization Before: 0
Total CreditLimit Before: 106k
Total new credit: 112k (after closure of all citi accounts)
Total BT funds obtained: 133k which includes 24k bt funds from now closed citi accounts and existing bt offer on existing account
Total Credit limit after AOR:190k
Cards applied:25

AA=Adverse action Taken because of AOR

AACiti Cash Returns 5% cashback for 3 months instant-Approved 4,800, instant cli to 5300 Citi Closed all her accounts
BOA 0%12m no BT fee Approved 2500, now 10,000 after reallocation
US BANK Baylor 0%12m no fee for bt for balances transferred with this application Approved 7000
US Bank (Elan cards 0%12m no fee No Balance Transfer Fees for balances transferred with this application Declined
AAAssociated Bank 0%12m no bt fee Instant approved 15,000 - Took 13400 BTCiti Closed all her accounts "too many new accounts"
National City - Quilter's Rewards 0%12m no bt fee first 60 days Approved 10000 Now only 0% for 6 months
Citi Business $150after 1st purchase 0%12m no bt fee Declined
AACiti Drivers edge 0%12m no bt fee Approved 6300 instant cli to 6800 Citi Closed all her accounts "too many new accounts"
National City- lifespring 0%12m no bt fee first 60 days ??? Deffered ??? Now only 0% for 6 months
Citi Upromise 0%12m no fee Declined "you already have maximum number cards"
Fifth Third Bank 0%12m no bt fee Deffered , "need more info about the business" decided not to pursue
BOA NEA WorldPoints 0%12m $30 bt fee Approved 5000
BOA NEA® AMEX 0%12m $30 bt fee Approved 2500
Discover more 0%12m $75bt fee -$40CS or $50 amazon GC at cardreviewer.com Approved 8000
Discover® Open Road 0%12m $75 bt fee -$40CS $50 cardreviewer.com "Error Duplicate App , will not be processed"
AA Juniper Bank Atlantic 0%15Months $75 bt fee Instant Approved 18,000
ChaseBusiness 0%12m 99 bt fee -$35CS Approved 10000
Chase platinum 0%12m $75 bt fee -$25CSApproved 9000
Advanta 0%bt 15Months $90 bt fee -$30CSApproved 2500
AAJuniper I Fly 0%12m $50-$15 credit after first use =$35 bt feeInstant-Approved 10,200 Took 10000 BT, paid down to 89% they closed the account "rapid increase in credit"
AA Juniper national parks 0%12m $50 bt fee Approved 2500 they closed the account "rapid increase in credit"
WAMU ESPN 0%12m $75 bt fee Instant Approved 5,000 (hopefully allows access to free TU credit monitoring)
Citi Professional no bt offer but $150 after $250 purchases Declined "you already have maximum number cards"
Chase UPS Capital 0%12m $75 bt feeApproved 10000
Amex Starwood Personal $25 from cardbenefit.com + 10,000 points redemable for $100 amazon GC or hotel nights Instant Approved $10,000

Asked for 24,000 BT on most apps, but I would not recommend asking for bt's on the app because most were either canceled or caused me more hassle.

tim1 said:
Asked for 24,000 BT on most apps, I have already bumped 4 TU inquires scince applying yesterday using 3 pulls between AMEX CS and NC.
new inquires:
EX 4
EQ 5
TU 5 but already bumped 4 of them

How on earth did you bump 4 inq's the day after they appeared? Took me about 50-60 days to start seeing B* on TU, and even longer for EQ.