Turned down for Amex!

rocky39

Hi
I applied for an Amex card the other day solely to use it for the cashback. (I buy a lot of things for work using my personal card & then get refunded so thought I may as well benefit!)

Received a letter this morning to say I have been turned down as I didnt meet their credit score :mad:

A bit confused though coz I've never had any problems in the past obtaining credit and:

- I earn in excess of £25k
- Currently have 3 cards with limits of £4k, £25k & £6.4k although first two have nil balance. The third only has approx £1000 which is a balance transfer on 0% which will be clear March 07
- I have no other debt other than a mortgage of £50k
- My credit history is A1 (I used to work for a finance company)

The only negative I can think of is that just over 2 years ago I had a Halifax online credit card. I used this card to pay an ongoing subscription & then cancelled both the card and subscription. Trouble was that the merchant took another payment of £9.99, never told me & Halifax had stopped sending email statements so I was not aware.

Only came to light a couple of months later when I received a threatening letter from Halifax as I was 4 months down. Paid immediately, explained to them & said I was concerned re this showing on my credit history - they said they would update. When I obtained a credit report a couple of months ago this account is showing as closed but prior to that as being 4m down!

Not sure if this is a problem though because the £6.4k card was taken out after this and no problems with that.

Does anyone think it's worthwhile appealling or should I just drop it & try another card. My other concern is that I understand some companies take into consideration the number of searches against you.

Any advice would be appreciated & apologies for the length of post but thought I better give as much info as poss - lol

Astaroth

Problem one could be the "black mark" of the late payments (assume it didnt get as far as a default notice).

Second problem is the fact that you have access to approx £36k of unsecured lending. As you say that you earn in excess of £25k I assume your salary is somewhere under £30k in which case over 100% of your annual salary is an exceptionally high amount of available credit. Banks are not so interested in what the current outstanding balances are as you could go out tomorrow and max them all out.

rocky39

Astaroth wrote:

Second problem is the fact that you have access to approx £36k of unsecured lending. As you say that you earn in excess of £25k I assume your salary is somewhere under £30k in which case over 100% of your annual salary is an exceptionally high amount of available credit. Banks are not so interested in what the current outstanding balances are as you could go out tomorrow and max them all out.

Thanks for the info Astaroth - I had never considered this could be why but when I think about it, it makes perfect sense. :A

M_Thomson

rocky39 wrote:

Thanks for the info Astaroth - I had never considered this could be why but when I think about it, it makes perfect sense. :A

I would say you being turned down is more to do with the fact you have a 4 month late payment on your credit file. I have credit cards that have combined limits of 3 times my annual income.

Bisoy

It has to be due to the few months that you made late payments and the possibly of your 2 cards of unused credit. Why on earth would any lender give you a credit card if you have £29k of unused credit. Bear in mind also that AMEX are a bit choosy and even cut down the limits of their loyal customers.

pin

I've found Amex a bit hard to apply with recently, been rejected twice in one year and yet have been accepted for other cards. The main reason they have said is overall credit limit is too high.

K9cuddles

FYI Amex has been slashing peoples credit limits.. the majority with good salarys and nil balances.. maybe because you fall in to that catergory their not interested??!!!