Tell me your Amazon Credit Card experience

[Sojourner]

These days my credit card cash rewards are outstripping the interest on my savings accounts and CD's.

Absolutely! The money I'll be saving by getting the signup bonus for my new Chase Southwest Rapid Rewards credit card (roughly $1,500 due to the free "companion pass") is at least three times as much as I'd be earning by moving $100k out of my Ally savings account paying 0.5% to one paying 1.0%... if I could even find such a thing!

 

[jazz4cash]

OP here, I ask about an Amazon Visa card, got positive replies, applied for the CC. I was denied because lack of Credit Cards and no Chase account.
So, Friday I received a "Your Dispute Results" letter from Experian.
I didn't dispute anything, I believe this is a letter sent any time you are denied credit.
There is nothing in the Dispute Results. I.E. nothing was disputed. It shows the one CC I have and all green since 2014. Then it has a chart of balances, payment dates , Scheduled Amount ($25) and actual amount paid from May 19 to the present. Actual amount paid is marked as

'No Data' for all those months. Each month was paid in full.


Then it gets to "Who has Viewed your Consumer Information"
Hard Inquires
JPMCB (Chase Bank) The company that declined me an Amazon CC.

Duration: This Inquiry is scheduled to continue on record until May 2023.


Reason: Credit Card with 0 Months Repayment Terms.


I don't get the, Reason: Credit Card with 0 Months Repayment Terms.
Does this relate to the 'No Data' on the payment history of the one CC I have?

I would call Amazon with the dispute letter in hand and ask for reconsideration. They might be also surprised that Chase denied your app for thin credit profile. Setup and/or use your Amazon account to establish the relationship.

 

[Walt34]

You probably have too slim of a credit history. Clean and perfect doesn't tell a lender you can pay bills. A lot of folks think no credit cards, no loans, nothing but one paid off card, is good.

That can very well be the reason. It seems kind of counterintuitive to me but that's the way the world is. One of the guys I worked with had always paid cash for everything, even his used cars, and had a very difficult time getting a mortgage when he wanted to buy a house. It wasn't that he had bad credit, he simply had no credit history at all. Evidently that can be almost as bad as no credit, but it sort of raises the issue of "if you can't get credit without a credit history, how are you supposed to establish that history in the first place?" Yeah, I know, department store cards, secured cards and such but for a younger person starting out that is a pita. Life ain't fair!

 

[W2R]

I got the Amazon Visa in the summer of 2014, and it's my only credit card. So, I can't really compare it with other cards. Also I don't know much about credit cards in general, since I haven't had any others for several decades. [...] For me it wasn't a hassle to get. I didn't have a credit freeze, though! I have no idea how much hassle that might or might not be to deal with. Anyway I applied online on the Amazon site, and was approved in less than a minute IIRC. They sent the physical card to me in the mail and I was good to go.

OP here, Great!, I applied for the Visa Chase Credit card. And I was denied.

This completely floored me! Especially given your good credit score, how could this be? But after thinking about this for a few days, I think I finally figured out what the difference was.

I got a conventional 30 year mortgage on my prior home through Chase Bank in 2002, and paid it off in four years by sending in whatever extra I could save each month in addition to my regular payment. So, Chase had a record of me. It didn't occur to me that Chase credit card approval would look at my Chase mortgage record but I think probably they did. I am thinking that possibly I was just lucky that the Amazon credit card was through Chase as well.

P.S. Yes I admit it, I'm dumb as a rock about things like credit.