Originally Posted by penner42

Pro-actively lowering them maybe USED to be a good idea, but I would say it no longer is. I did that when I wanted to apply for the CSR... lowered my credit with Chase by $10k. Then when I applied, they declined me, didn't want to offer me more credit (even though just a few weeks ago I had $10k more credit with them!) and couldn't find enough credit to move to get me to $10k! I was willing to close my Amazon card that had a $5k limit, but didn't really want to because it's my oldest card, and didn't want to close any of my other personal cards. Luckily, I was able to convince them to approve me due to assets, not income. While I gave them truthful numbers, they didn't actually ask for any proof of those assets.

My advice is leave your cards open, and then if you are rejected, offer to close them or move credit to the IHG for approval. Don't reduce your limits in advance. It seems to only be a negative at this point. Maybe cancel or reduce limits on your business cards if you have any, since you can't move that to the IHG anyway. But not your personal cards.