Originally Posted by
MJ777
I didn’t get denied, but I did have a somewhat interesting experience getting my Alaska MBNA card recently.
Context: My credit score is rated ‘excellent’, I have a reasonably high income and I haven’t had any trouble with credit card apps to date - mostly Amex and TD aeroplan.
I had two existing MBNA accounts that were somewhat dormant - a $0 annual fee platinum plus and a line of credit. I was approved for the Alaska account after a slight delay with a $5k limit. I figured all was good. I then went to regain access to my online account for the platinum plus account and after a couple phone calls found out MBNA had cancelled this account as well as my LOC to make room for the Alaska card. I wasn’t too fussed as they really were dormant accounts but it was still a bit of a shock. No warning, no rationale and no communication, they just went ahead and did it. A bit of a head scratcher to me.
Maybe too much existing credit capacity? Possibly something to do with transitioning to TD? Both accounts were initiated pre-merger.
Could be a similar situation with your wife. Certainly put me at a bit of unease for future apps with MBNA.
Sadly, your experience is not isolated to MBNA. To my knowledge, every financial institution has in its T&C they can reallocate your credit lines and amount as they see fit without prior warning. It is one of the downsides of credit churning which most people are unaware of.
Another FI "trick" is that if you have a 0% card and a 20% card with the same FI they can decide overnight to put everything on the 20% card and close the 0% one without warning you. There are a couple obscure rules on when they can do this, but bottom line, they can and will if it works out for them.
And the worst trick is, if you set up a direct debit, they can self serve as they see fit. Or, if you have savings at the same FI, they can self-serve in these savings as they see fit.
99.99% of the time these do not happen when you pay everything in time. 0.01% of the time it does happen when they get panicked from credit file information they don't like.
Sounds in your case they might not have liked some combinations (credit file vs credit use with them), and decided to give you a sweet (the card you wanted) in order to close the rest (you don't use much) without getting in a fight.
Stay alert.