Capital One Tightens their Credit Card Churning Rules

Capital One has tightened their rules regarding approving multiple credit cards at the same time and won’t allow more than one card per six months.

Background

Capital One has always been something of an anomaly; they don’t seem to care much about good credit scores and things like that, but they have weird things that trouble them like “too few revolving account” and other things that don’t always add up.

They also pull all 3 credit bureaus.

The one good thing about Capital One was that they didn’t have any rules against approving multiple cards at once. If you were deemed worthy in their eyes – that’s a big “if” – you could potentially get 2 or more cards on the same day. And even two of the same card on the same day, e.g. two Venture’s.

Capital One also has some nice signup bonus offers, such as $400 with Venture personal credit card or $500 with Spark business card.

Changes

Recent reports indicate that Capital One now tightened the rules of how often they’ll approve credit cards, and they now consider multiple applications as “duplicates.” They won’t process the second application at all, and no hard pull is done.

Not only are doubles of the same card considered duplicates, but even two different cards are considered duplicates, and even one personal and one business, apparently.

You can still get seconds of a card that you already have (e.g. if you got a Venture last year, you can get it a year later), but you have to wait a while before applying for it.

Data Points

Report #1

One report is from a friend who got a Spark and a Venture back in March, then applied for two different versions of Spark three months later in June. Capital One didn’t even process the applications at all since they were flagged as duplicates…three months after his previous application round.

there is currently a pending or recently processed application with Capital One

No hard pull was done, as mentioned in the letter from Capital One (below) and confirmed by my friend. The computer system automatically knew not to process the application at all.

My friend spoke to a rep who confirmed that there is a new 1/6 rule, and you can only apply for a card once per 6 months. She suggested that he apply again in September. (Since the application wasn’t processed at all, the clock wouldn’t reset with the denied application.)

Here’s the denial letter from Capital One.

capital one duplicate denial 7:13:16

Report #2

The other report is from Milesperday who also applied for Spark Cash and Spark Miles. The second application was denied as a duplicate.

He was able to get a second Spark card of the same variety that he already had from a year earlier, but he wasn’t able to push through two applications on the same day for two different versions of the Spark card.

Report #3

In the comments to this post, Leon reports applying for two business cards and one personal card. Only the first application (Spark Cash) got approved, the others were considered duplicates.

This indicates that you can’t even apply for one personal and one business card at the same time. Presumably, you’ll have to wait six months between any applications, and staggering personal and business doesn’t help. In my opinion, this makes no sense to limit personal and business combined, but I don’t work for Capital One. 🙂

See the comments of this post for additional data points.

Current Rules

Updated the rules to reflect what we learned in the comments

Here are the current Capital One churning rules as I understand them:

  • You can only apply for one Capital One credit card per six months. We’ll call this the 1/6 rule.
  • All credit cards are included in this rule, both personal card and business cards. For example, if you apply for the Venture card, you won’t be able to apply for Spark until six months later.
  • Any cards that are applied for past 1/6 won’t be processed at all and no hard pull is done. It’s an automated system denial.
  • You can still have multiples of the same card open at the same time, e.g. two Ventures or two Sparks, so long as you space out the applications. (1)
  • You’ll get the bonus on a new card, even if you have the exact same card already, so long as you are approved.

 

As a side note, remember to freeze your Experian credit report before applying for a Capital One card. Capital One will process your application with just Equifax and Transunion pulls when Experian is frozen.

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Matty Rex
Matty Rex (@guest_1792549)
February 4, 2024 11:41

DP: more evidence supporting 1/6 rule for a mix of biz and personal.

2/2/24. Approved for Spark Miles (Business).

2/3/24. Had recently received an invitation to apply for Quicksilver (Personal). Went ahead and applied, but was denied with same language as in the post (“pending or recently processed application”).

How can one possibly accumulate miles with a 1/6 cap? Organic spend????? lol

Faraz
Faraz (@guest_859120)
December 18, 2019 13:42

Recently got denied for the Capital One Venture card. The letter said:

Based on your credit report from one or more of the agencies on the back of this letter, number of bank cards tradelines opened in the last 24 months

·Based on your credit report from one or more of the agencies on the back of this letter, there are too many new revolving accounts

Max
Max (@guest_1760607)
December 18, 2023 14:43

Very similar here. Cap One Venture, applied last night, called the recon line and they read off the card terms as possible reasons. None applied – they were all related to X cards with Cap One recently, closure due to poor standing etc. This is the first Cap One I’ve applied for in a solid 8+ years.

I received just the first line:
Based on your credit report from one or more of the agencies on the back of this letter, number of bank cards tradelines opened in the last 24 months

Prov1
Prov1 (@guest_733782)
March 12, 2019 14:53

I just want to add another DP about applying for Capital One Venture card. I responded to a “exclusive offer” mailer 60K miles with $3K spend and was denied immediately. I received an email the next day stating too many credit cards opened on your Trans Union within last 24 months. At the time of application I was 3/24 with last card opened 9 month ago. They showed my TU score as 802 on the letter.

I called customer service and was escalated to a supervisor. The supervisor was literally useless. She could not discuss the application or credit report nor reconsideration. I have never been declined except for Chase’s 5/24 rule (before I knew there was a rule). The supervisor suggested that I reapply in 6 months, I informed her that I would still be 3/24 and why would I take a hard pull to lower my credit score to be denied again……crickets…

To my fellow users of this platform, please stay away from Capital One. I found my interaction with them unpleasant, unhelpful and not transparent about there business practices. I will be contacting Jennifer Garner to let her know whats “not” in my wallet.

Runsong
Runsong (@guest_711232)
January 24, 2019 11:43

Does the application by invitation letter follow this 1/6 rule?

D
D (@guest_673312)
November 15, 2018 11:39

Approved instantly online.

– In the past 6 months, I’ve opened Amex Gold, Amex Plat, Chase Hyatt, and Avianca Vuela.
– I have a very old Capital One Quicksilver card that I haven’t used for years. It was a downgrade from some card that I can’t remember that had an annual fee and a bonus.
– Credit score is excellent, but just into the range.

Bikini Patrol
Bikini Patrol (@guest_680765)
November 29, 2018 03:16
  D

how many cards have you opened in the last 24 months? I am at lol/24 and wondering if its worth applying (lol=so many I can’t count)

MickeyMouse
MickeyMouse (@guest_629607)
August 15, 2018 02:03

Did not think Business Cards Applied to this rule because I didn’t read this post.

Just applied for the Savor Card and was denied with no HP’s done, opened Spark back in May guess I’ll have to wait until November, if the Bonus is still $500 then, if not I may be under 5/24 then and hit up Chase 😉

I know many of you are thinking if you’re gonna be under 5/24 why not do Chase first then Savor…Right?

I’ve already opened 3 Chase Personal Cards this year (all non-5/24 Cards) a 4th is pushing it then shortly after another new account don’t want to risk shutdown mainly because I value my Hyatt Card very much lol.

Minal
Minal (@guest_564552)
February 27, 2018 00:20

Can i apply for 2 capital one cards (1 business/1 personal, or 2 business or 2 personal) on same day and be approved with single hit on credit inquiry report?

Would they approve and merge it as one credit inquiry only?

Gadget
Gadget (@guest_564564)
February 27, 2018 01:50

Yes, more than likely. But your going to get a hit on all 3 bureaus.

https://www.doctorofcredit.com/things-everybody-should-know-about-capital-one-credit-cards/

Bob
Bob (@guest_564722)
February 27, 2018 16:31

Are you sure one can apply for 2 Cap One cards on same day? I think i read it somewhere here only that this company does not approve 2 or more cards on same day.

Papps
Papps (@guest_549505)
January 10, 2018 15:49

I have a DP too. It appears Capital One has 5/24 (or 6/24) rule, but that includes every credit card you have. I have 7 active accounts including Chase, Amex and Capital One, Citi etc. but I was denied for Capital Venture. Language similar to – https://travelupdate.boardingarea.com/capital-one-using-the-24-month-card-limit-rule/

Papps
Papps (@guest_552850)
January 21, 2018 12:38

5 (2 Chase, 2 Amex, 1 Citi)

Doug
Doug (@guest_665272)
October 30, 2018 17:59

I can corroborate this DP. I also just got denied for a Capital One Venture card, with the reason being too many bank cards opened in the last 24 months. I believe I am at 7/24, plus 3 business cards.

Ryan
Ryan (@guest_616845)
July 14, 2018 07:04

Capital One just approved me for a Spark Cash card and I was at 6/24 when I applied. They approved me which put me at 7/24 now.

Victor
Victor (@guest_447812)
July 27, 2017 14:03

Question regarding the capital one venture card. I originally got it back in Nov. 2014 and downgraded to no fee Venture One last Oct. 2016– if I apply for the Venture now, would I qualify for the $400 bonus?

Thanks!

Slidellian
Slidellian (@guest_481437)
September 22, 2017 13:19

Probably so.

Brian
Brian (@guest_444766)
July 22, 2017 19:56

This tweet from Capital One regarding someone else’s denial due to an “in progress” appilcation also seems to confirm the 6-month wait time: https://twitter.com/AskCapitalOne/status/875501425673084928