Recently I gave into temptation and applied for two new credit cards with nice perks and no-fee balance transfers: the Citi Professional Card and the Discover Miles Card. I got approved for the Citi card right away and got a $9,000 credit limit. I’m going to make a purchase right away and get my $100 gift card. I’ll also call Citi and move my credit limits from my dormant Citibank cards to this one increase the limit to close to $20,000, making it nice and ripe for a future 0% APR balance transfer.
I haven’t heard from Discover yet, the online application said it might take up to four weeks for a decision? Sounds like a long time to me. I did request $15,000 in balance transfers, so maybe they’re pondering if I’m worthy 😉 I also moved recently (less than a year).
I applied for a handful of 0% BT cards all at the same time. One of those was also the Discover Miles Card, which took about two weeks longer than any of the others. The only other card to take this long was the HSBC MasterCard.
Neo
I applied yesterday and didn’t seen any balance transfer request for the CITI card. But maybe that’s because I didn’t act like a first-time applicant. I already have another Citi card and used my login info for that one. If you apply, make sure you pretend like you’re a first time applicant. I keep screwing up these opportunities. Ugh…
When you move your credit limits from old cards to the new card, the old cards’ limits become $0 while you’re still keeping them??
I haven’t done them but am planning to do something like that with Citi, too…
Neo – cool, that’s good to hear.
clicclic – If you’re talking about the Citi Professional or other certain cards, remember that you can request a balance transfer any time within the first YEAR of having the card, and the 12 month 0% starts from when you request it!
Besides, you need to make a purchase to get the 100 bucks, and if you have a balance transfer at the same time you’ll be paying interest on that purchase until you pay off the balance transfer.
A – You need to leave a minimal amount, either $500 or $1000 on the card. I’m typing something up on this right now.
Do you ever worry about your credit score with all of the different credit cards you have applied for? I’m pretty certain that the number of different cards you have effects the score…
Have you guys tried Advanta Business credit card?
They offer 5% on gas purchases, office supplies, telecommunication (like phone) services, etc., with no annual fee. The office supplies are based on the store, therefore the purchase from Staples or OfficeDepot will qualify.
Credit score is a valid concern, but I have never seen the actual number of credit cards, by itself, affect my credit score. It’s how to you use them that affects your score. I have about 20 cards and my score is above 700 right now, and I try to keep it above around 680 at all times.
I tried to apply for Advanta once a couple years ago, but got rejected, don’t remember if it was because I had no business or what. They recently limited their cash back to only $25 a month too, which is kind of a bummer.
Don’t buy Discover Gift cards!! Ordered gift card…it was charged to my account right away….they claim they sent the card 4 days later….didnt show up…called a couple times and was told to wait longer. Called again and was told someone would call me back….no one called. Called again and told them it had to be lost and was told they couldnt find any record of it being sent out and could “expedite” another card I asked them what they meant by “expedite” because I needed it right away. They said someone would call me back….no one called. By this time almost a month had gone by. Finally, I got mad and called back and told them to cancel it. then they refused to cancel the card and credit my account because they said they just supposedly sent out another card by regular mail the day before. (Expedite!!?? how many days later???) I told them to just cancel that card because I needed it “NOW” and had to give another present instead. They supposedly could cancel the first card (because it was lost…supposedly) but now said they couldnt cancel this card they supposedly just mailed again and I would just have to use it when I receive it. I will never order another discover gift card and am telling all my friends and family not to.