I've heard stories of chase abruptly closing off all accounts for churners. Will opening a checking account decrease likelihood?

While I have no evidence to support my assertions, I suspect that any activity you undertake that contributes to Chase's bottom line will help you from being singled out for account closure. For example, having an active checking account, a mortgage or actively using at least one of their cards (beyond meeting minimum spends). Which is one of the reasons why I choose to keep my Sapphire Preferred card for daily spend.

Banks look at the value of the "relationship." That includes checking accounts. But, the question is how much of a balance you generally keep in the checking account. It also includes CD's, mortgages and any other services.

I'm not a churner per say. I add 2-3 new cards a year for my wife and 2-3 for me. But the more value you create for them the better off you are. That's why I opened a Chase checking account. I may also open a Citi account in the future. If I refinace I'll look at both of them first. Just makes sense to me if their the same price. I don't mind giving something back when I have to do it some where any way.

I can tell you a resounding NO based on sagas told to me via people's PMs asking for help.

Having a checking account or even a checking account + a saving account would not make any difference if your credit card activities are deemed "not for intended purposes", or your credit profile is deemed too risky after analysis of your credit card history.

In fact with Chase, the credit card dept is independent to the banking dept. While your branch manager may be willing to go batting for you in the case you have some adverse actions from the credit card dept, the success rate is very low once the Risk Management / Fraud Dept is involved, all bets are off.

One of the help seekers actually first had all her credit card accounts shut down after her bank branch manager went batting for her to get a new card opened. Then some unrelated events happened (she thought those might be the trigger) a couple months later, her bank accounts were shut down as well. She asked the branch manager to intervene for her once again and was told once the Fraud dept is involved, there is nothing he can do / help. Said person was contemplating to file a complaint with some government agency. I have not heard any more news since, so no idea what might be the eventual outcome.

If all your Chase cards are just opened for the initial bonuses and you have opened a boatload of them in a short period of time, you better start using at least one or two of them regularly. Else the beginner's luck could eventually run out when the system eventually flag the pattern of behavior.

The best policy is to have a no fee card with Chase and keep that card active - Freedom is a very good choice as a relationship builder.

thanks! very informative post! I've got 4 chase cards in the last 4 months, most recently sapphire preferred which i haven't met the $3,000 yet. Also have a chase checking account. Haven't been using the accounts that much. I think that's just the perfect ingredient to getting closed.

We have 2 Chase cards--Freedom opened July 2011, and we filled the 3K min spend in just one month, with a trip to Africa. Continued to use the card regulary, about 2K per month.

Fast forward to Jan 2012, got the Chase Sapphire Preferred. Filled the minimum spend of 3K in less than one month (daughter's college expesnse came due).

Continued to use both ^^ cards, appx 2k to 5k per month, total.

Now April 2012 applied for the Avios BA card (Chase), as we know we will make the 20K spend easily.

Chase did not give us the card; we have a "pending review".

We has a checking account with Chase (among other banks); own our own 500K home, substantial investment assets and a trust fund. Yet Chase didn't approve our 3rd app.

So, who can say?

Not necessary.

As long as you dont be aggressive to push more approvals of new cards, you should be fine.

Just make use of your cards periodically, small charges are perfectly fine. Just dont sock-drawer them right after you get your bonuses.

The No.1 No No is for those who got the high % rebate cards for the first 6 months, and then they hit those cards very hard. Unusually high rebates are flagged by the computer. That is an invitation for scrutiny of the accounts.

"Pending Review" does not mean Chase did not give you the card. Have you gotten a denial letter? If so, what reason is given?

Chase would not see your "500K home nor your substantial investment assets and a trust fund", if those are not with Chase.

What Chase sees, is, your available credit lines versus your stated income, your utilization ratio on your credit cards, and of course your payment history with Chase - even though you may have paid it in full each and every month, it may not long enough (Less than a year it seems) for Chase to feel comfortable especially if you spend heavily on the cards, i.e. high utilization ratio.

Like Happy said, I really doubt they can see that you have any bank accounts with them, much less any investments. They are separate entities and unless that it is deemed necessary for people in risk to access that, it is probably a limited few if so. I try to keep Chase's liability limited to owning 50% of my overall outstanding credit lines. I am also very careful about my income vs overall lines with all cards. I don't request credit line increases anymore as that would change the ratio of income/available credit lines.

Pending does mean squat either. I thought I was sure that I would be denied for 5th card within 8 months. I was timing it to have them close out my BA card for a transfer of lines. I'd rather them close out the BA instead of me. I got the pending but planned to wait until the 3rd day to call. Just before I called, I logged into my Chase to surpisingly find my new UA approved with a ridiculous line that was more than double my highest single line.

What I'm trying to point out is that we did / have everything just as it should be --great credit, checking account with Chase, more than adequate income, no abuse of credit lines, own home, ontime pay, no debts (no car or mortgage payments) and hit the minimum spend. Yet we did not get instant approval, and few people who have received the "pending review" letter go on to receive the cards with having to make a phone call to the reconsideration #.

I've never had a pending review until a couple of weeks ago. I had never called and didn't really want to. But I did and after a couple of minutes talking to a CSR we moved some credit from a card with $30,000 CL and instantly approved. I waited 3 days after the pending notice before calling. 2 days later I recieved a letter saying sorry but denied, dated the day before my call. 3 days later I recieved the CC's. So if I hadn't called it would have been denied and I would have had 1 Chase card with $30,000 CL instead of now having 1 with $20,000 and 1 with 10,000. It was easy , painless and worked. PS I have a 801 credit score, I think they have limits and mine was all on one card?

I think a lot of us who chase CC bonuses have some guilt in the back of our heads, which makes us wonder if we would become 'suspects'. Before I got into this game, my thinking used to be... "They better be happy I'm giving them $60,000+ worth of business annually". Now, usually that thinking is "I hope my high spending doesn't raise any red flags (because I'm earning points)"

I guess it just comes with the territory.

Sheesh. Instant approval is nice but it is not a given.

I know we dont get instant approval any more once we have maxed out our credit line total with Chase based on its computer model. Do I get hurt with my little ego that we always got instant approval with them but not any more? Heck No! As long as the recon guy / gal is more than happy to shuffle lines / close the card(s) we dont want any more to give us our new cards - it is perfectly fine. I pretty much know what the ball park number of our max line is. I also know when and if we close cards we dont want, we would get instant approvals again. However I much prefer THEY close the cards in exchange the new cards via the recon dept instead of US close the cards we no longer want. Do you see the difference here?

Regarding your no mortgage no car loan thing, we are in the SAME situation. In this stupidly designed system, having such debts actually HELPs one's FICO and one's chance to get new credits, as long as the total credits are still well within the acceptable ratio to your income and you never late pay.

Reason(s)?

They see you are being financially responsible in making required payments to an existing debt. (forget about people like you and us that dont have such debt any more because we already paid and in the clear.)
So there is a payment history they can rely on for future payments.

They see that you are a good borrower that they can give you more credit, IN HOPE that you would eventually use the REVOLVING line so to generate the much more lucrative Interest charge then the transaction fee the bank can get from each charge.

Do you see that you are NOT the best customer the bank could possibly have. In fact, in the industry, you and we have the nickname as being "deadmeat" because we are not profitable to the bank.

Get over the hurt feeling on the "Pending Review".

I have got over my hurt feeling long long time ago to see my neighbor who has lower income, mortgage, car loan, sometimes does not pay her cards in full because she is short of cash, but she has a FICO HIGHER than mine who owns the home free and clear, same with the car, pay cards in full every month, a very large asset base, so on so forth... This is how the financial model is designed. If you want to take advantage of it, get rid of your emotion and play the game within the rules.

Unless Chase give you a reason to deny you, there is nothing to fret / be angry / annoyed about.

Yes they do have limit, not on one card, but the combined total of all your cards - that is what is referred to as "Total Exposure". The words are self-explanatory enough I think.

Chase model often works this way, it figures out how much total credit it could extend to the applicant, existing credit lines on other cards are subtracted, leaving the room (if there is any) for the new card. One time husband got a $2000 line on a CO card (downgraded from the version applied) because that was that much left that Chase could give. The other quirk is, Chase would give you almost ALL the credit you could get, on the application and leaving you no room at all for any more application. This is your case here.

Even if you are denied, you could still call and the denial would be reversed if a reallocation of credit line is all it needs.

I always proactively call after 24 hours - when the application is "verified" by the system and the computer model has spit out whatever is needed - usually due to maxing out total credit extended based on stated income.

After a while you know how much credit in total EACH bank is willing to extend to you. Keep in mind that each bank also sees other banks' credit line to you by ways of credit report details.

This is not a game you are totally in the dark. Using some intelligence and common sense, you often can figure out what to expect and act accordingly.