Brewer20

How many new cards in the last 24 months?

crazy_p.o.w.

All my cards with Chase have been in the last 24 months. We got married this year in Aruba and have been planning it for a while to pay with mostly points. All the flights for 4 people were free and even got 1 trip to Las Vegas to boot. Used a lot of Marriott points on hotel in Aruba as well.

Happy

Only in the wishful thinking mind would link the 2 things together. Normal logical thinking would not. But you should have known now that anything can be used to paint a picture that fits one's bias if one insists to.

sdsearch

Were your 2 AS cards both personal, or one personal and one business? (I'm not sure if we've establlshed whether Chase views business cards in the count of 5 or only personal cards.)

TravelingFitzMe

Another point I just thought of that may or may not be relevant...

Around late May or early June, after seeing all the posts about the 5/24 rule, I was hesitant to apply for any UR card, so I decided to use the Chase pre-qual tool first. Now, I have no idea how accurate it actually is so I'm obviously not suggesting using that and that alone as a go-by. But when I used it in May/June, it said there were no offers for me. I had used it before (March/April) and all UR cards showed up, but now that I officially had 5 cards in 24 months, nothing showed up -- so I assumed I was stuck waiting until November to apply for anything else.

It wasn't until late July that it started populating with offers again. Obviously I didn't apply for anything earlier in the summer when no offers appeared (so there's no telling if I would have been approved or denied), and I was still skeptical about it once they started showing back up. But, as I said earlier, even with 5 cards in the past 20-ish months, I was instantly approved for both CSP and Freedom on the same day.

sdsearch

If by "this" you mean the "reward seeking", yes, because (a) Chase can't easily tell that it's a 75,000 bonus miles card that you opened and canceled (credit reports don't mention things like that), and (b) they can't easily tell if you did even way more spend than was necessary for the bonus on another bank's card).

So it's not they chose to apply it only to Chase cards, it's that it's only easy for them to see details in your reward card use habits on Chase cards.

But if someone has done too many cycles of Citi Exec opening and churning in the past 24 months, they'll quickly run up against the other "5/24" issue on Chase UR cards. But at least for now, their Citi Exec churning should not in itself hurt them from getting a Chase partner card.

TravelingFitzMe

They were both personal cards.

isle-hawg

I have noticed on several occasions on my credit report that it can take 2 plus months at times for a new account to show up. My "guess" is that your Alaska air card did not show up on the CR that Chase pulled for your last app?

A free loan is the only reason to apply for this card and that is "reward" that costs a bank money.

Credit card companies make tons of money on credit cards. Las Vegas casinos make tons of money on gamblers. The casinos loose money on Black Jack card counters and ban them from their casinos when they are identified. This seems to be Chase's initial step to identify those of us who game the system in our favor vice the banks. I cannot blame them. It is irrelevant what one's credit score is or net worth if we are going to cost them money vice make money off of us a a customer. I am somewhat surprised it took this long for the CC companies to start closing the loopholes to give us so much free/highly subsidized travel. But I am glad it did take this long - wish it would of lasted longer.

RNE

Absurd analogy. We are independent reps for Chase, reaping merchant fees for the bank. But our commissions are variable and Chase is cutting that back for some of us. Oh well.

isle-hawg

How strange - in this particular post I "thought" I was agreeing with you on this singular point my interplanetary friend?

If everyone did what you suggest to appease Chase and stay in their good graces you are correct - In that fantasy world Chase makes money off of everyone. Some if not most on FT who have paid attention for the last 5+ years and acted on that for their own benefit are money losers for the banks despite what we spend since many of us have been all in mostly for the sign-up bouns' then rinse and repeat. We have been the cost of doing business for the banks. Chase as well as all the other banks are finally looking to stop the "reward chasers" interesting you of all people now take a different stance that the banks - in this case Chase is not looking to eliminate the "reward chasers"?? I guarantee they still want folks to sign up for their cards - just like Vegas wants betters - but just like Vegas does not want betters to come to their casinos who have figured out how to turn the odds in their favor - neither does a bank want us to game their rewards in our favor vice theirs if they have any clue.

joecool1885

I don't know what Chase is up to, but if all they're really after is stopping the reward chasers, I would think the first (and more reasonable) step would to be to change their policy on sign-up bonuses so that it's once in a lifetime.

Brugge

As sdsearch has pointed out recently, there are two different problems for Chase. One is "reward chasing", where people repeatedly churn a card for the sign up bonus, only do the minimum spend, and then stop using it. There are two obvious ways to limit this behavior. 1) As you said, go to the AMEX policy of once in a lifetime. 2) Set up their computers to deny apps from people who have done this with Chase in the past.

Option 2 is not being used currently, and option 1 is being used very sparingly.

The new 5/24 policy has no effect at all on limiting "rewards chasers". All it does is prevent people with more than 5 new accounts in 24 months from getting a new UR card. Including people who have been extremely profitable customers for Chase over many years. Someone (actual post on this thread) who has been spending @$30K a year on a CSP for the past 10 years is denied for a measly Freedom card just because they have 5 cards from other banks in the past 24 months. This is absurdly irrational, but it is also exactly what Chase is currently doing.

The other possible problem for Chase is extending too much credit to people who might default. Does the new 5/24 policy help with this? Not at all, as Chase is denying a Freedom card with maybe $3K CL, and then instantly approving a UA card with a $20K CL. Again, this is absurdly irrational, but it is also exactly what Chase is currently doing.

From my perspective, there is only one possible explanation for the new 5/24 policy for UR cards: a corporate "nervous breakdown" at Chase, causing them to lose all capacity for making rational decisions.

Happy

A drastic measure to curtail expenses funding UR points which I am sure are funded as expenses incurred. Same goes to the "free" loan on the Slate. They can prevent expenses from even being incurred by severely reducing the issuance of the UR cards and the Slate card.

OTOH, the various currencies on the co-branded cards most likely have already funded long time ago when Chase entered agreements with its partners and purchased the "currency" in advance for future use. In other words, these expenses have already incurred long ago, almost like a sunken cost in accounting jargon. They are carried on the books as expendable "assets" (because Chase is the buyer, while the partners are the sellers). If they put the same restriction on their co-branded cards, then they would lose the transaction fees and some revolving interests charges (yes there are people carry balances, you even read it on FT!) while the "assets" rot on their books.

Can't think of any other rational explanation on the current policy as no matter which angle you look at it, the whole practice does not make any sense from either risk control or "reward" control.

RNE

But that would preclude letting its best customers continue to churn.

When we wield our Chase credit cards (instead of other banks'), we become de facto agents of Chase, not "customers" in the sense of a casino. Completely different relationship.

aza72

Makes sense. IRRC Chase prepurchased about ~100 Billion United miles to help UAL with cash flow issues in 2008 and allow them to avert bankruptcy. They may also have agreements with various partners regarding CC approvals.