Does refusal for new card affect existing ones?

[Twitchy]

Hi all, I hold a personal Platinum and BA Premium, and a business Gold and business ICC (international currency card). High max spends on each, always paid off in full prior to statement date.

Just applied for the relaunched BA Accelerating Business card and have been turned down. The email said the decision was ‘in particular influenced by information on your credit report’. To be fair, I’m holding a lot on several personal cards at the moment owing to a big recent purchase, all of which will be paid off in Jan.

Concerned now that this refusal might cause them to reconsider my currently held cards or reduce their spending power. Anyone know if that’s likely or do you think existing accounts remain untouched if run properly?

Thanks for any info.

[Harrier25]

As far as I’m aware, your existing cards will be unaffected. In fact it would probably help your cause with a new application if you reduced your credit limit on currently held Amex cards.

[JDB]

@Twitchy – well, it’s a message from Amex, so best not to ignore it entirely, particularly as they say the rejection relates to information on your credit report rather than Amex’s overall credit exposure to you, although they might simply be concerned about too much unsecured credit elsewhere. It will have an impact, so it’s probably worth checking your report to check there is nothing untoward.

The days of loads of cards with high limits have rather passed. Amex has moved rather abruptly to tighten its previously very lax credit underwriting in response to current high delinquencies, worse than the industry.