Thanks for the response to my question about the Nordstrom visa card. Your explanation made perfect sense to me. You mentioned that the department store card was upgraded to the visa card. Was this a request you initiated or did Nordstrom offer you an "upgrade" after you had been with them for a while? Thanks Jim
Heck, I never even applied for the store card. Shortly after I moved to the Seattle area, I received a "welcome to the Nordstrom family" letter. I was a good store card customer (never late, fairly high usage) when Nordstorm introduced the Visa. I can't remember exactly how it worked, but I think Nordstrom FSB just sent me a letter saying "you're a good customer -- we'd like to upgrade you to a Visa card." At the time, Nordstrom was one of the first retailers to issue its own Visa, and I thought it was pretty cool. (Plus, if I remember right, there was a better annual rewards program then. I do remember getting dividends applied to my Nordstrom purchases once a year.) Both the Visa and the store card are listed on my credit reports. The Visa is "included in BK" and the store card "closed by credit grantor, never late." I read that Nordstrom FSB -- now based in Arizona -- is actually going to start offering other banking services. But I have no other details what they will offer. Maybe money-market accounts like Ford Credit and BMW. It would seem to be a good fix for the Nordstrom clientele.
