I recently did a AOR with 10 applications(4 citicards, 2 chase, 3 AMEX and 1 BOA) and one of them was for FW's favorite, citi cashreturns card. Upon the receipt of the card, I quickly spent 11K out of 11.65K credit line and then paid off within a week. Today, when I called in to inquire what happened to my accounts, they told me that all of my accounts were closed by their credit management department because there was something "negative" about my experian record. The decision was final and there is nothing I can do except to ensure all activities shown on experian were accurate. My question is what exactly triggered the account closures. I seriously doubt that the culprit is my AOR, rather than cashreturns. Your input will be appreciated.
Thanks all. I have a few more questions regarding this situation
1. How long do I have wait to before I have a shot at obtaining new credit cards, considering there will be 4 "accounts closed by grantor" on my credit report.
2. I have 15K TY points left. Should I rush to redeem them for GCs after all accounts closed?
There are some threads specifically on citibank closures, but it is not the first time that somebody tried to game the Cash returns by paying the card down mid cycle and have it closed....everything right now is going to be looked at with the banks in bad shape...you got to greedy..
Banks are very cautious right now due to the credit mess. Keep utilization down and your scores up. Using too much credit will scare some banks and they'll close your accounts
Mithrin
Nerdy Member
posted: Jul. 29, 2008 @ 5:38p
Probably not a good idea at the moment to get a new card and bring the utilization to 94% before the first statement is even cut. They may also have just been nervous to see 11K in spending happen in the first couple of weeks on a card. Spending at that rate, you're looking at 286K/year in spending, which probably doesn't line up with your HHI. Then they see by your reports that you've just had a jump in inquiries and/or new credit accounts, not the best signs.
They may have also been suspicious that you bought $11K of dollar coins from the US Mint, and then deposited them all with a teller to pay off the bill...
What state are you residing in? (Don't want to assume that playing for LA Galaxy is making you a California resident ). I'm interested on a data point on where CITI switched to pull Experian.
lhendricks92 said: Why does David Beckham need to play credit games? Aren't you a bazillionaire? For the thrill of scamming 6000 TYPs from Citi. Isn't that why we all do it?
Do not, I repeat, do not do AORs at the same time as exploiting, I meant "exercising", rewards. When good rewards deals are gone, I'm going back to AORs. Rewards outweigh AOR profit by several orders of magnitude.
Keep it simple.
kkerty89
Senior Member
posted: Jul. 31, 2008 @ 8:27a
alpinewhite said: Do not, I repeat, do not do AORs at the same time as exploiting, I meant "exercising", rewards. When good rewards deals are gone, I'm going back to AORs. Rewards outweigh AOR profit by several orders of magnitude.
kkerty89 said: alpinewhite said: Do not, I repeat, do not do AORs at the same time as exploiting, I meant "exercising", rewards. When good rewards deals are gone, I'm going back to AORs. Rewards outweigh AOR profit by several orders of magnitude.
good call. just make sure it's not a citi biz card.
glxpass
Senior Member - 5K
posted: Jul. 31, 2008 @ 2:36p
alpinewhite said: Do not, I repeat, do not do AORs at the same time as exploiting, I meant "exercising", rewards. When good rewards deals are gone, I'm going back to AORs. Rewards outweigh AOR profit by several orders of magnitude.
Keep it simple. Nice conservative advice. If you wanted to stretch the limits a bit, and inquiries weren't an issue, you could do a business AOR, but not with issuers that you're exploiting. We did a mini business AOR for my wife, and received the cards in the last couple of weeks or so. We haven't yet tried to re-allocate personal to business, i.e. National Parks to BankAtlantic business, Chase personal to business, or attempted to consolidate the Associated Bank Platinum Visa to the CashReturns card. We will *not* do any BTs with the AB card, since it's a Citi co-branded card.
WalStMonky
Happy Member
posted: Jul. 31, 2008 @ 4:52p
The trouble with all the above speculation is that it's baseless. The wife-o-rama here was in May, it was also a 10 card AOR, included the Citi Cash Returns card, which has been mercilessly exploited up to 99% of CL and paid down weekly due to Citi's nonsense rules about combining credit limits. Wifey has suffered no AA and the 90 day promo period ends in about 2 weeks. About the only difference I can identify between her's and OPs AOR is that of the 9 cards she got, 7 were business cards. But then OP didn't say anything about balances or too many open accounts so...???
How long do I have wait to before I have a shot at obtaining new credit cards, considering there will be 4 "accounts closed by grantor" on my credit report.
That would be today. 'Closed by grantor' is meaningless on a tradeline that is otherwise 'paid as agreed'. Yes, you've heard the urban legend that this is a credit ding hundreds of times I'm sure.
RedCobra
Serene Member
posted: Jul. 31, 2008 @ 5:35p
It all comes down to personal philosophy. What is your comfort level "pushing the envelope". If Citi does a credit pull one month after an AOR and sees something it doesn't like (too many new accounts, inquiries, etc.) they WILL close all your accounts. It is possible to get them reopened but it's a major hassle, I know. True, business accounts rather than personal will cut down the risk. But just do the math. With interest rates where they are right now, the extra profit, even from a major AOR ($100K+) can't even come close to the reward $$.
WalStMonky
Happy Member
posted: Jul. 31, 2008 @ 7:11p
Actually, I'm kind of math challenged. Wifey opened a Citi AMEX and Citi Business card and received 30,000 TY points. Let's call that $300 for the sake of argument. She also opened 2 Chase Business accounts that ended up with a total of $60,700 @ 0% with BT fees of $174. I expect to earn a bit better than $2000 on that money @ 4%. OK, I never paid too much attention in math class but I did come away with the impression that $2000 is better than $300. So how about a link to the cards that pay better than $1000 for signing up?
Then there's the Citi Pro card she got, with 0% on purchases and a 1% rebate which opened a Citibank checking account with TY points and got 26,500 @0% + a rebate of $265.
If Citi does a credit pull one month after an AOR and sees something it doesn't like (too many new accounts, inquiries, etc.) they WILL close all your accounts.
Yes, what's your point? My point was that the baseless speculation above is untrue, and that's based on wifey's experience. So similar to the OPs, and I promise they've done an AR on all her accounts since May, and all her accounts remain open and in good standing, knock wood. I'd sure like to figure out what it is that those who receive AA and those who don't have in common. 10 application AORs including a Citi CashReturns card for purposes of rape and pillaging Citibank do not qualify based on direct personal experience. I've tried to get people to volunteer data points when this happens, but they seem to already have their minds made up as to why, regardless of whether there's any basis to their 'reasoning'. I just wonder what the magic is that's kept wifey and I insulated. I'll tell you right now we go balls to the wall. I'm sure not going to quit playing a lucrative game because I might get tossed by the ref. Is it the fact that we're homeowners rather than renters? Older rather than younger? Is it that she's got 27 years at the same job (yes that has driven her stark raving mad)? I sure don't as I change projects more often than my underwear. Is it the 27 year CRA history that makes a difference? Perhaps they just enjoy having monkeys for customers, and are willing to bend over backward to maintain the relationship? There aren't very many of us with SSNs you know.
DjPiLL
Senior Member - 2K
posted: Jul. 31, 2008 @ 7:50p
WalStMonky said: That would be today. 'Closed by grantor' is meaningless on a tradeline that is otherwise 'paid as agreed'. Yes, you've heard the urban legend that this is a credit ding hundreds of times I'm sure.
+1
I can say with fact that this has no bearing on my credit score. And likewise I was a victim of Citi adverse action. Life goes on.
I'll be doing AOR2.0 in a few months. I'll be able to tell you guys first hand if I get approved for new Citi cards after having some lines closed. Problem though is my cards were closed in December (three months after the start of my first AOR). I plan on launching AOR2.0 in October which will be 10 months after the card closures.
I did have a Citi credit supervisor say its typically best to wait at least 6 months minimum before applying for new credit, but who knows how true that really is.
RedCobra
Serene Member
posted: Jul. 31, 2008 @ 9:39p
WalStMonky said: Actually, I'm kind of math challenged. Wifey opened a Citi AMEX and Citi Business card and received 30,000 TY points. Let's call that $300 for the sake of argument. She also opened 2 Chase Business accounts that ended up with a total of $60,700 @ 0% with BT fees of $174. I expect to earn a bit better than $2000 on that money @ 4%. OK, I never paid too much attention in math class but I did come away with the impression that $2000 is better than $300. So how about a link to the cards that pay better than $1000 for signing up?
Then there's the Citi Pro card she got, with 0% on purchases and a 1% rebate which opened a Citibank checking account with TY points and got 26,500 @0% + a rebate of $265.
If Citi does a credit pull one month after an AOR and sees something it doesn't like (too many new accounts, inquiries, etc.) they WILL close all your accounts.
Yes, what's your point? My point was that the baseless speculation above is untrue, and that's based on wifey's experience. So similar to the OPs, and I promise they've done an AR on all her accounts since May, and all her accounts remain open and in good standing, knock wood. I'd sure like to figure out what it is that those who receive AA and those who don't have in common. 10 application AORs including a Citi CashReturns card for purposes of rape and pillaging Citibank do not qualify based on direct personal experience. I've tried to get people to volunteer data points when this happens, but they seem to already have their minds made up as to why, regardless of whether there's any basis to their 'reasoning'. I just wonder what the magic is that's kept wifey and I insulated. I'll tell you right now we go balls to the wall. I'm sure not going to quit playing a lucrative game because I might get tossed by the ref. Is it the fact that we're homeowners rather than renters? Older rather than younger? Is it that she's got 27 years at the same job (yes that has driven her stark raving mad)? I sure don't as I change projects more often than my underwear. Is it the 27 year CRA history that makes a difference? Perhaps they just enjoy having monkeys for customers, and are willing to bend over backward to maintain the relationship? There aren't very many of us with SSNs you know.
It's not baseless. It's from personal experience. If you'd like to send me a courteous PM we can discuss it offline. It's also not very smart to brag about doing certain things to certain banks as they likely are reading these threads.
Disclaimer: By providing links to other sites, FatWallet.com does not guarantee, approve or endorse the information or products available at these sites, nor does a link indicate any association with or endorsement by the linked site to FatWallet.com.
Members of our community may attach files to a post in accordance with the User Agreement. FatWallet is not responsible for the content, accuracy, completeness or validity of any information contained in any attached file. Files have *not* been scanned for viruses. Be especially wary of Excel files which may contain malicious content.
