Severe Adverse Action from Citibank

As was theorized earlier in the thread, it is probably a smart idea to group all of your Citi applications. You will notice in my AOR thread that I submitted 7 Citi apps consecutively towards the beginning. I had trouble with 1 application and submitted one last one at the very end of the process. It may be that the inquiry diff between the last app and the first group flagged my account for manual review.

If I were to do it again, I would suggest leading off your AOR with not more than 4 or maybe 5 apps. I have a feeling that if you can fly under the radar for a month or so after getting your cards (with normal card usage) that you should be fine. Frankly, a rolling AOR with Citi, ie. with 2 apps at a time or some such plan, may be the preferred option going forward.

Obviously, take all this with a grain of salt. I think its fair to say that we are so early in the process with Citi that all of this is speculation. It does seem like things have recently changed with Citi's credit approval and account review processes.

furrypanda said: Just found out this morning that all 4 of my Citibank credit cards were closed after my Citi Diamond card was rejected at McDonald's. I was told by the credit rep that I have too many open revolving accounts. There are 2 things that lead up to the closure and I am not sure if they are related. First, I applied for a Citi Diner's club card last Friday over the phone. Second, I swiped $6k worth of gift on Saturday. I have 4 Citibank cards below and I use Citibank Diamond as my main card. It is paid off in full every month. Any idea?

Citibank Diamond $26k limit $1k balance
Citi® Platinum Select $8k limit no balance
old Citi Mastercard $3k limit no balance
Citibank Business $7k limit and $5k BT

Questions:

How old are all of your Citi cards?
Any new cards and/or inquiries with other issuers?
Are you saying you bought $6k worth of gift cards? If so, is this something you normally do and did you receive any calls from Citi's fraud dept?

furrypanda said: I think whatever Citibank is doing is ridiculous.

I agree. Is there anything else you can think of that could have drawn Citi's attention? I can't imagine they are reviewing every card holder's file for too many open accounts, and I don't see how your purchases and/or single new app could trip an account review trigger.

furrypanda said: Just found out this morning that all 4 of my Citibank credit cards were closed after my Citi Diamond card was rejected at McDonald's. I was told by the credit rep that I have too many open revolving accounts. There are 2 things that lead up to the closure and I am not sure if they are related. First, I applied for a Citi Diner's club card last Friday over the phone. Second, I swiped $6k worth of gift on Saturday. I have 4 Citibank cards below and I use Citibank Diamond as my main card. It is paid off in full every month. Any idea?

Citibank Diamond $26k limit $1k balance
Citi® Platinum Select $8k limit no balance
old Citi Mastercard $3k limit no balance
Citibank Business $7k limit and $5k BT

Perhaps they see your personal cards with little to no balance and your "business' card with a high balance...they could get nervous with that business card, possibly they might suspect if this guy has a business card with us, there might be other business cards that they can't see?? Isn't that how it works, business cards are not on your personal credit report?? I don't know.

I don't know. Maybe the application process for the Diner's Club card triggered the entire review but I do not yet to see a hard pull. It would be really weird if I receive a letter saying that I have been approved for the Diner's Club card.

To answer some of the question:

1. For the last 12 month period, I have less than 3 inquires per credit Bureau.
2. I have actually never done any AOR. I have been opening up one credit card account every 10-12 months and transfer a small balance (less than 10k) to a savings account for the 0% APR.
3. I was transfered back and forth between different department because the reps do not know what is going on and eventually ended at their credit review department. I was told to wait for a letter in the mail.
4. I have around 20 revolving accounts including credit card (citibank also), car loan, and mortgage.

I have a quick question about revolving accounts. I just purchased a FICO report from Trans Union (767)and it is saying one of the negative factor on my account is also the number of revolving accounts that I have. It lists a total 30 accounts but 8 of the accounts are closed already. Is the credit bureau or Citibank counting those 8 closed accounts as revolving accounts or should I contact Trans Union to remove them?

Thanks.

ifyouhavetoask said: stook2001 said: I live in one of the more wealthy parts of Dallas. I can easily document my HHI as well as liquid cash and net worth, etc. I was told that they didn't care about any such things and that they were making decisions purely on the basis of inquiry activity. This seems like an awfully ham handed approach since access to credit alone isn't really what Citi should be concerned with. I agree with your general comment. Was I too aggressive with Citi, surely yes. However, I can easily back up my qualifications for the total credit I have as well as the credit extended specifically by Citi. We'll see how they respond. Despite the chest pounding (wealthy part of Dallas, liquid cash and net worth, etc.) you have to use some common sense here.

People who actually have the things you claim to have, don't usually waste their time chasing a few grand in credit card balance transfer money (or posting about it all day on the internet). Why? Because they're too busy earning a high HHI, and protecting their assets. Citi knows this, and that's why they closed your accounts.

All the bragging in the world doesn't change that. In fact, it further reinforces the reasons why Citi closed the accounts. You're presenting yourself to be something that doesn't make sense, and Citi sees it for what it is.

Not meant to be a personal attack on you. Instead, it's just an observation. Maybe one that will help you get your Citi accounts reopened... if you get my drift.

Not sure why you got so much red as you are spot on.

The Banks have profiles of how and what the average consumer does.. and they have variances for those same behaviors. When you do things outside of normal ranges, they tend to get suspicious and that is when you are most likely going to be hit by adverse action.

furrypanda said: Just found out this morning that all 4 of my Citibank credit cards were closed after my Citi Diamond card was rejected at McDonald's. I was told by the credit rep that I have too many open revolving accounts. There are 2 things that lead up to the closure and I am not sure if they are related. First, I applied for a Citi Diner's club card last Friday over the phone. Second, I swiped $6k worth of gift on Saturday. I have 4 Citibank cards below and I use Citibank Diamond as my main card. It is paid off in full every month. Any idea?
Just speculating here, but I suspect that the combination of a new Diners Club App Friday night and then a Rolex watch purchase Saturday may have spooked an easily-spooked company into fearing the worst. I would most definitely pursue this to the end: heck, just show them where you had $12K in purchases the previous month - had you intended to declare BK then would you have paid it off? Heck no. I strongly believe that yours is not a gray-area situation; I believe you are absolutely correct in not having provoked A/A, and should have this action overturned.

74ak said: curtisekarr said:
Just speculating here, but I suspect that the combination of a new Diners Club App Friday night and then a Rolex watch purchase Saturday may have spooked an easily-spooked company into fearing the worst. I would most definitely pursue this to the end: heck, just show them where you had $12K in purchases the previous month - had you intended to declare BK then would you have paid it off? Heck no. I strongly believe that yours is not a gray-area situation; I believe you are absolutely correct in not having provoked A/A, and should have this action overturned.

Well, you are correct that A/A was not justified. However, it is not about potential BK. The problems is that citi is in trouble and is trying to minimize losses, maximize profits...what is the best way to do it? cut all highly educated, finacially sophisticated AND unprofitable customers (not paying fees and interest) that may or are taking advantage of citi (I almost cried here).
So, furrypanda is not average Joe: he has citi's money, does not pay fees and interest charges, pays off balances in full, and is hiding that debt off his personal credit report ! and probably keeps it in high yield account

The fact is that citi is taking action against all customers that fits FWF profile (in order to max return on capital (ROC)) and just looking for ANY excuse to do that(so they can avoid any legal action against them). be it one new application or 5k rolex
According to furrypanda he/she? has only $5K in BT money on the CitiBusiness card. The everyday purchases are on the Diamond card (which earned Citi a minimum of $360 in just the last two months, so is therefore profitable to them). This isn't exactly "hiding" a great deal of debt from your personal report, nor is it uncommon for Citi customers to PIF each month. Most A/A detailed in these pages has some connection to a recently completed A0R; furrypanda's does not.

74ak said: PIF(score)=>$0 in profits for citi(actually losses) and lower ROC; times are changing for citi and citi is changing the rules of the game...
You're dwelling upon Citi allegedly dumping unprofitable customers. Well, Citi earned in just the last two months from this one customer a minimum of $360 (2% of $18K). Even if you PIF, they still earn 2% from your purchases. That's not the type of profile that CC companies want to lose.

I figure I would post in this thread although I created a topic a couple weeks ago on it. I have all new (now just passed 1 year) accounts from Citi.. a citi pro, citi biz, and citi diamond that were opened for my first AOR last year. I had my Citi cards all paid off (about the week prior) and did a mass CLI. All inquiries for Citi hit TransUnion (I b* everything off prior, so this is all I had on it now as far as inquiries) and I received a call one day later asking for financial details, why I have so many cards open, the inquiries, etc. I openly explained that I was taking advantage of 0% offers and I had the funds to pay them off (which he could believe easily seeing as my cards all just got paid off). He asked about balances on other cards that he saw on my credit report and I said well it's good timing you called now, just like I paid off your cards I just paid that one big one (a $34K balance from BOA) last week as well, however it was too soon so it wouldn't be showing on my credit report yet.

He did ask if I was transferring those balances yet again to new 0% cards and I told him I wasn't. I had all the funds (and more) sitting in a savings account so I was free to pay everything off in a moments notice if need be. He ended the call thanking me for my business and that was it. A few days later I did actually get ONE of the cards CL increased from $19K to $25K. It was the Citi biz. No other cards got CLI's yet but nothing I have got taken lower either. The Citi Pro card I received a letter on just asking to provide more financial details so I included last months bank statement. We'll see how that goes.

I agree with what a lot of others have stated, rolling AOR is the way to go. That's what I've been doing with my wife, b* all the inquiries off in between, and we've had a 100% success rate on new apps, and with great CL's figuring her credit. I also agree that business cards are the way to go and try to go as far as you can with them. Her best lines are business, and it keeps your personal credit profile clean. On a final note, having added her as an AU to my best (highest CL, oldest line) card helped for sure.

lhendricks92 said: I'll add another data point....

Citi closed all my lines about 3 weeks ago, including my uber-useful CashReturns card. They pull EQ for me, and I was only showing 1 inquiry at the time of their soft AR pull. I can think of 2 potential activities that triggered a manual review. First, I applied for CashReturns, Hilton Honors, and Associated Bank back-to-back-to-back in January. I consolidated all cards to create a $47K line on the CashReturns. Second, I abused the heck out of the CashReturns card - probably "spent" about $250K during the 3 month 5% cash.back promo period. Once the manual review was triggered, Citi closed my accounts for having too much available credit. I've been careful to keep utilization low (about 15% overall) and my FICO high (about 775 on EQ), so "too much available credit" caught me a bit by surprise.

Fortunately, I was able to get a hold of a reasonable supervisor in the credit management department. Once I convinced her I was not a credit risk (20 year unblemished credit history, 5 year old fixed mortgage with Citi at 50% LTV, high liquid net worth, etc.), I was able to get my most valuable lines (including CashReturns) restored. I was persistent, yet calm, and it took several phone calls and discussions.

I didn't spend much time debating the merits of using too much available credit as an indicator of risk - I kept focus on my only goal of getting my lines restored. The game has changed, Citi is hurting, and was up to me to convince them I had been erroneously labeled a risk.

Hope this helps someone.

Thank you the info. Did you get all of your 5% bonus paid to you on the Cash Returns card?

Also how in the world did you manage to spend 250K in 3 months on a 40K something CL? Unless you kept paying the account several times per statement to keep reducing the balance and adding new charge.

*If* you did that, perhaps that might have been the biggest reason for the alarm. IMO "too much available credit" was just an excuse Citi used.

TyroneSchulace said: my banker said, "You're not one of those Fatwallet guys, are you?"
Holy crap!

DiMAn0684 said: TyroneSchulace said: I did something "suspicious" the other day, and my banker said, "You're not one of those Fatwallet guys, are you?"

Did you ask him why trial deposits were so small?

What does that mean?

DiMAn0684 said: Did you ask him why trial deposits were so small? I was just making sure they weren't going to take them back like TDAmeritrade. Next time I'll go to a 0.01 balance before they have a chance.

TyroneSchulace said: lhendricks92 said: CashReturns card - probably "spent" about $250K during the 3 month 5% cash.back promo period.You probably triggered a real person looking at you. Certainly at Chase, they know who we are. I did something "suspicious" the other day, and my banker said, "You're not one of those Fatwallet guys, are you?"

Well, THAT's a concern.

lhendricks92 said: Second, I abused the heck out of the CashReturns card - probably "spent" about $250K during the 3 month 5% cash.back promo period. Okay, so why is the word "spent" in quotes? What were you doing if you were not actually spending? Buying traveler's checks? (OH for those days to come back!)

Considering with a 762 TU (fako) score I just got denied for a biz card due to "too many recent inquiries" --- as in ONE inquiry done minutes before and no other older inquiries whatsoever --- I would say yea, they're hunting AORers. It makes sense really if you consider there are maybe 3,000 people doing them, taking avg of $50k at 0% and they make no interest on that $150,000,000 per year. Yep, worthwhile problem to crack down on I'd say.

GroveStreetOG said: gwu1986 said: DiMAn0684 said: TyroneSchulace said: I did something "suspicious" the other day, and my banker said, "You're not one of those Fatwallet guys, are you?"

Did you ask him why trial deposits were so small?

What does that mean?

It means, I think, that we like to take every advantage we can (at least with respect to large, impersonal institutions). The trial deposit represents free money to us, and we're not satisfied with small amounts, we want them to be larger (I know that's how I feel about trial deposits).

Higher trial deposist = better security. That's my only concern

I have a $36K credit line on a no-fee 0% APR CitiBusiness card, and I'm trying to decide whether to go for a $32K BT. I did an 89% BT on my husband's Citi Professional card with no adverse action a couple months ago but I don't know if times have changed in the past couple months. Any advice? thanks