Getting Approved for the British Airways 100,000 Miles Bonus
Update: Some offers mentioned below are no longer available. View the current offers here - British Airways Visa Signature Card
I've been getting tons of, "Will I get approved?" emails about the Chase British Airways 100,000 mile bonus. I'm not employed by Chase, so I can't tell anyone whether you will or will not get approved for the card, but I will relay some information and anecdotal experiences so you can get a sense of whether you should apply.
Another thing to note if you haven't applied already, is that I got word yesterday that Chase is scaling back the commissions greatly (for people like me) for this card due to overwhelming initial response. While the deal is still active, this leads me to believe it could be pulled at any time if they continue to get an "overwhelming" response. Note: I would still promote this deal even if I wasn't getting a commission, because it's honestly an unbelievable deal, as I outline in my other post today about using ExpertFlyer. Overall, if you've been waiting on the sidelines to get in on this offer, I'd recommend acting sooner rather than later because as with all amazing deals, this won't last forever.
Some things to note:
1) You can apply for multiple Chase cards within the same month and get approved (had a family member who had just gotten a Hyatt Visa and was approved for the BA Visa with no issues)
2) If you apply and you get a pending review message, you shouldn't worry - that is happening to a lot of people who end up getting approved
3) If you applied for the card without a BA Executive Club number and you get the "pending" message and then get an email welcoming you to the Executive Club, that generally means you were approved.
4) If you get "pending" or "denied" you can call and have a rep review your application and shift around some of your Chase balances if necessary and get the application approved. They seem very willing to work with people to get them approved.
Below are some of the key emails/Flyertalk posts about people's experiences getting approved- most of them are positive.
TPG Reader: "I currently have 4 Chase credit cards,United, Continental, BP and Hyatt (Credit lines of $30k, $1k, $4k, $16k) Total exposure: $51k, 33 years old, no balance. Applied for BA card and saw it was approved for $1k limit. Laughable. So I called Chase and they transferred me to the lending department. Spoke to someone who said they can move my limits around but I cannot have more than $30k limit combined. According to them, my income does not match up to my total exposure. I never asked for credit line increase, it's just what they gave me. For example, last year my BP card totaled $801.39 in purchases, all gas, card is in my car. Previous limit? $4k. Now I have BA/UA/Hyatt/BP at $10k/$10k/$10k/$500."
Flyertalker 1
"Just logged into my Chase account online and saw that the BA card was added with a $20K credit limit. I haven't received my actual card in the mail yet though. I am really surprised, but pleased, that I got this.
I've had 3 hard pulls since March with Experian (Capital One Venture, Chase Hyatt, and Hilton AMEX), and 9 hard pulls across all 3 credit reporting agencies. Also, fwiw, I closed my Chase CO card in early March because it was coming up on the 1 year renewal. My credit score is in the upper 700's."
Flyertalker 2
"data point here.... applied for Chase Hyatt card 4 weeks ago. Approved
Then applied for Chase BA card 4/8/11 approved today."
Flyertalker 3
"FYI, mine took 2 days from application until they approved it. I called in twice to the number posted above."
Flyertalker 4
"Just an additional datapoint for those monitoring how long it takes to get a response from Chase once one gets the pending notice...
Applied Tuesday afternoon 4/5; credit report pulled Saturday 4/9; no email from Chase, but when I log on to my Chase account this morning, I see my new BA card there with credit line details etc.
Since I know there is some discussion on how long to wait between Chase cards, I got the UA card in mid January and now this one in early April."
Flyertalker 5
"After applying, don't worry about the 'still processing' notification. Mine also took about 5 days because they have many applications to go thru at Chase and I was told it was due to security checks. I also have other Chase ccs, but they said the hold up had nothing to do with credit, it was just their standard security checks that were taking a while. Most don't get instant approval anymore since more must be manually approved. I did get approved and for much more limit than I anticipated without having to move credit. They also told me they wouldn't just deny it for that reason, they would call first to see about moving credit if needed. Even after approval I never received an email (at least not yet)."
Flyertalker 6
"Called in to determine the status of my application. Was told over the phone that I was declined. However, after they asked me a few questions and asked me if I wanted to move some of the credit line from my Chase CO card to BA, I said yes, and was approved!"
Flyertalker 7
"I applied last week and called a few times and they said it was pending and that nothing could be done. I called today and they finally said it was rejected because I had too many recent Chase applications. I asked them to split my credit limit and they agreed to open this card."
