Getting my AMEX 12th charge card and 7th credit card

AMEX is so fickle. I don’t think anyone knows what the true limits are; we all have heard it’s “10 charge cards” but some people can go over and some hit a hard limit. Same with credit cards – we all assumed it was “4 credit cards,” but some people can get 5 and even up to 7. I think the limit is definitely more nuanced and no one has pinpointed what the true limit is.

Case in point – Back in December, I was at 10 charge cards already (6 personal PLATs and 4 biz PLATs) and tried to get the Morgan Stanley Plat (I already had an MS account,) but was denied for hitting the limit. I then waited until the end of January to close one of those personal PLAT cards, called in to recon the card, and was approved to bring me back to 10 charge cards.

Over the weekend, I realized it had been over 90 days since my last Business Platinum/Gold AOR, so I went to apply for the cards. I thought I’d get rejected since I currently have the MS Plat, 5 personal GOLDs and 4 biz PLATs,) but shockingly I was instantly approved for both cards to bring me to 12 charge cards.

Then on Monday, for shits and giggles, I figured I’d get some credit cards too since it was over 90 days since my last cc AMEX AOR. My current portfolio – EDP, Hilton, Bonvoy, Biz Hilton, BBC. So here’s the thing – I have a 2nd MR account by accident. I thought it would give me a new identity, so I wanted to test if that was true and I applied for a Biz PLAT and it went into review. So that theory is out the window. I then went to apply for the Bonvoy Business when I was logged into the 2nd MR account and was instantly approved (my 6th cc.) Then to do some more testing, while still logged in, I applied for the Biz Skymiles Plat and was instantly approved as well (my 7th cc.) Note that all of these approvals were using my SSN, and I actually don’t think the 2nd MR account has anything to do with the approvals.

Someone I know who had 5 cc’s (2 BBP, Aspire, Bonvoy, Biz Bonvoy) tried to apply for Biz Hilton and was denied. So it makes no sense why he got denied for his 6th cc but I was approved for my 7th cc.

I think the variables in the algorithm are charge/cc split, Biz/Pers split, non affiliate / affiliate (Hilton, Marriott, Delta, etc) as well as WHAT CARD you are trying to add. If you look at my portfolio before today, I had 1 personal amex, 1 business amex, 2 personal affiliate and 1 business affiliate. The 2 new cards were business affiliates so that brought me up to 3 busines affiliates. My friend who failed had 0 personal amex, 2 business amex, 2 personal affiliate and 2 business affiliate cards. He definitely should have been able to add the 3rd business affiliate card unless AMEX only lets you have 4 BIZ CREDIT CARDS but not 5. I don’t know; I’d need more data points to try to figure this all out.