(Reports) Chase Tightens Up Approvals On Business Card Applications

Anecdotal reports indicate that Chase has tightened up on approving applications for INK business cards, especially since last month (October 2024).

I’ve been grumbling about this for a while now (I had been seeing anecdotal evidence of approval tightening even from before October), and there’s now a Reddit r/churning survey indicating the same. It’s not a huge sample size, but worthy of discussion.

The biggest factor seems to be that those who already have open INK cards are less likely to get approved for a new one. Here are some stats:

  • Those with zero INK cards had an 87% chance of getting approved for an INK card. (14)
  • Those with one INK card had an 68% chance of getting approved for an INK card. (19)
  • Those with two INK cards had an 57% chance of getting approved for an INK card. (28)
  • Those with three INK cards had an 18% chance of getting approved for an INK card. (40)
  • Those with four INK cards had an 0% chance of getting approved for an INK card. (14)

Some other factors that seems to have an effect of approvals:

  • Have an open Chase business deposit account had a mild positive effect on approvals.
  • Preemptively lowering credit limit had a negative effect on approvals. (This is quite surprising as previously lots of evidence suggested that have a lower credit limit would greatly increase the chances of an instant automated approval.)
  • Floating large balances on your Chase cards had a negative effect on approvals.
  • Other factors like business revenue, years in business, and spend volume on cards did not necessarily have much effect on odds of approval.

There isn’t much data on other Chase business cards outside of the INK family, but it seems those might also be getting tougher on approvals.

Thanks again to r/churning for the data, you can read the discussion on Reddit at this link.
    Chuck
  • On November 13, 2024, 22:05
Tags: chasechase ink

View Comments (96)

  • I was denied for an Ink in August and September. I have 3 Inks now, one of them is older than 12 months and I suppose I can close it. Do I get better chance if I close this one before applying again? I read conflicting information, on one hand it seems one less Ink increase the chance, on the other hand recently closed Ink might add to the reasons to decline. Also it seems the new consent is to transfer the CL to other cards before closing instead of let go the CL to reduce overall CL?

    • I would close the >366 day old one ASAP then wait a full cycle before your next Chase app.

      If you look at the survey results, the number of open INKs outweighs all other factors.

      I've always thought it was a good idea to wait a month after closing an INK and/or transferring CL before applying but that's just intuition. I've pushed it a few times and gotten away with it but not since August.

      I would not transfer the CL before unless you need it on another card. Higher total CL with Chase is definitely not helpful. I think the negative association with reducing CL has more to do with the common practice of lowering CL on open cards.

  • Why do people keep so many Ink cards instead of closing them out? Especially now if it will seemingly help in getting approved for a new card?

    I've got a couple open riding out the 0% APR, but I intend to close them once that expires.

    What am I missing?

    • Most of us already close them after 12 months. It's thought to be risky to close them sooner. That leaves a minimum of 3-4 open on the (formerly) optimal schedule.

      Something apparently changed in September but there have always been occasional anomalous denials so it wasn't obvious from just a few DPs.

      By now almost 2/3 of churners on the normal schedule have applied for a new INK since September so there are enough DPs to analyze.

      • Thanks for the info. I missed the 'schedule' of when to open these cards. I was just going randomly as I hit the SUBs on other ones.

        What the best timing?

  • "Those with four INK cards had an 0% chance of getting approved for an INK card. (14)"

    I had 5 Inks (including 2 legacy Ink Plus) and applied for current Chase Unlimited w/900k bonus promo last month. Was approved immediately. That makes 6 Inks total. If it matters, I have 30+ year history with Chase (pers, biz, mortgages, etc), and 850 FICO. All my Inks get max churn, then sock drawer for rest of year.

  • I was approved for an Ink Unlimited last month after a decline/reconsideration. The odd thing is their fraud team got involved and twice had me verify a few things. I've had over a dozen Chase biz cards in recent years and there was nothing unusual about this application. A recon rep agreed to approve on the condition of reallocating credit but it was the fraud team that gave me the final approval without reallocating.
    I wonder if there's been more and more people utilizing 0% biz offers with no impact to their credit other than a hard pull and letting that money earn interest via treasury direct. Also guessing Chase wants to keep the 0% intro offer in place but filter out more churners. Hoping P2 can get another Ink for tax season.

  • I have 9 Inks so I guess I'm getting off the train. Yes, I max out the 5x bonus on all of them every year and they're more valuable to me in totality than it would be to close 7-8 of them and hope for a new approval.

  • Amex wised up to the employee card racket. Chase is wising up to the Ink racket. No surprise. I'm waiting for Hyatt to go dynamic systemwide.

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