Several years ago there was a scare on FT that credit card issuers were closing dormant accounts. I recall sporadic reports of it happening with Citi, less so with Chase. Citi at the time had much more churner-friendly policies; thus I surmise they had more cleanup to do as they tightened up. At any rate, I've let my Chase IHG Select go well more than 12 months without a charge, other than the $49 AF, twice in the past 4 years.

As a best practice I do try to charge at least one ordinary purchase to each of my cards every 12 months. A few weeks ago, for example, I charged grocery shopping of about $30 to my IHG Select card. I figure that gives me a degree of protection in case a bank suddenly decides to do spring cleaning on its dormant accounts.