Introduction
Before we get started, note that this page is a work in progress and I’m hoping readers will contribute their data points. Recently readers and people across the web have reported that Bank of America have either denied or approved their Merrill+ cards, that’s obviously nothing new but what is new is that some people who received approvals have been contacted and told their application was “approved in error”. Reader Darv was the first to mention this and Sirtheta put together a warning post found here.
The Rule
Shortly after this reddit user Kilifi posted the following “rule”:
Merrill+ cards will be denied (or approved and then denied) if:
- You’ve had 4 or more Bank of America applications in the last 12 months
- You’ve had 5 or more Bank of America applications in the last 24 months
- Currently hold more than 8 existing Bank of America cards
I’m going to call this the approved in error (AiE rule). Seems to be affecting more cards than just Merrill+.
The Data Points
As everybody knows, it’s never a good idea to take everything at face value on the internet so let’s see if the data points back up this rule or not (please remember to share yours in the comments).
Confirms rule:
These data points show denials or approved in error for people in accordance with what the rule states.
- Approved in error with 4 accounts in the last 12 months, hit the spend requirement and received the bonus and then was told the account was approved in error (they redeemed their points)
- Denied with 6 in the last 12 months
- Denied with 5 in the last 12 months (specifically 5 in one day)
Slightly confirms rule:
These data points show approvals for people that should be approved according to the rule.
- Approved for Merrill+, Alaska Personal & Business (first Bank of America cards)
- Approved with 2/12 and 3/24
Goes against rule:
These data points show people that were approved when they should have been denied according to the rule.
Other data points:
- Denied with 3Â accounts in the last 24Â months. Slightly odd data point, would have possibly been more interesting if it wasn’t for one of the cards being in 2015.
- Denied with 2 accounts in the last 12 months
- Approved in error with 4 cards opened in 2015
- Approved in error with one in the last 24 months
Our Verdict
Honestly I’m not 100% sure what’s going on here, I have a few random thoughts:
- Approved in error seems to be more likely to happen when the Merrill+ application was done on the same day as other applications
- Bank of America might not have finished processing all of the “approved in error” cancellations, thus causing some false negatives or similar.
As always, I know my readers will come through with some data points to help us work out what’s going. Please try to provide as much information as possible if you were “approved in error” at minimum the following would be great:
- Bank of America cards in the last 12 months
- Bank of America cards in the last 24 months
- Current Bank of America cards
- Did you apply for multiple cards at once?
- Did you received the approved in error notification? If so, when?
- When did you apply?
I’ll add to the above if I think of any other useful questions.
