Originally Posted by
mintcilantro
I had read all the warning posts and had moved majority of MS activitiy away from chase checking. What probably happened was my high office supply spend caught their eye and the manual review uncovered my MS.
That seems like a reasonable assumption.
Originally Posted by
mintcilantro
I'll never know what happened but that's what I think. I think most people be careful of following activities
- AoR with too many cards. Unfortunately I opened 7 cards in last 3 months (due to citi aa 100k appearing just after my 5 app aor).
- pay off balances as soon as you can (I did this with chase but not with other issuers)
- spending more than CL esp in bonused categories
- checking account activity that can give any whiff of MS (AP, quick pay, cash/MO deposits, payments to multiple CCs)
- payments to Chase CCs in cash/MO or from accounts not in your name (e.g. BB that's not your own).
I think if you are doing only one or two of above, it will not likely cause problems. But if you get caught with multiple of those, you could get in trouble.
That seems reasonable, too.
The (my) bolded items above make me wonder...
1. Pay off "as soon as you can" - do you mean, make multiple payments to reduce your balance during your billing cycle (short cycling) - to allow yourself to effectively "go over" your CL? I have heard this may be a red flag.
I would make the distinction between paying multiple times during a cycle (paying down balance) and then quickly charging more (increasing balance) - which I think they may look worrisome to them - and simply sending an early payment or two so that when the statement closes, your balance is not a high percentage of your CL.
2. "Spending more than CL esp in bonused categories" - I think that having a consistent and disproportionate spend in high bonus category is already a red flag. If you do that AND exceed your CL (I assume by doing the "short cycling" mentioned above), then I would not be very surprised that bells go off in their Bad Cop division.
3. checking account activity that can give any whiff of MS (AP, quick pay, cash/MO deposits, payments to multiple CCs) - My question on this is the
cash aspect. I do, occasionally, pay off a Chase CC at a local branch in cash (on the order of maybe $1000 in twenties). It had not occurred to me that they might sniff anything funky from that. I generally do not pay Chase CCs via Bluebird or other check payment services, and never pay from anyone else's accounts. I wonder how much risk the occasional cash payment is - I'm guessing that, by itself, not much.
I do not have a Chase checking account - I think I'm gonna keep it that way. The wife *does* have one though (we auto-pay our Chase mortgage out of that). Hmmm.
Ultimately, I think you're right, that it's a combination of things that probably got you, not any single item.
Thanks for sharing the data points (and I hope you find solace over in the Citi world).