Originally Posted by hurnik

It depends on which credit bureau and which credit card you're applying for.

If my memory serves, Trans Union "dings" hard inquiries more than Equifax (so your FICO scores can be many points different between the 3 bureaus).

I'd suggest you get a copy of ALL THREE bureaus. You can get the free experian one and use credit karma for Trans Union and Equifax, for these purposes.

You'll notice that (more than likely) all 3 bureaus will show a different number of hard inquiries in the past 12/24 months. Typically the credit card companies only care about the last 12 months (although this isn't a hard and fast rule).

For example, Barclays seems to pull Trans Union and is 'very sensitive' (IMO) to inquiries in the last 6-12 months. If you have more than 2, they will typically decline. Chase seems to pull credit bureaus based upon your state. I'm in NY, so they pull Equifax. They don't seem to be as picky about hard inquiries (compared to Barclays) but again, it will depend on which bureau and what your inquiries are for the last 6 and 12 months.

Typically in the denial letter, they'll give a variety of factors, so it may not be "just" the # of inquiries (although it CAN be). Perhaps you're at your max credit line to income ratio, etc.