How do I get American credit cards as a Canadian?

In this article, you will find out more about my own experience that started in July-August 2017. As of January 2021, I own my 7th US credit card and my US credit score is 780.

Some processes have changed since then, but the big rules are there.

Whether in Canada or the United States, your credit history is generally linked to your Social Insurance Number (SIN in Canada, SSN in the United States), as well as other information such as your first and last name, residential addresses or past and present employment.

SIN and SSN both have nine digits. But a very important reminder: don’ t use your Canadian Social Insurance Number (SIN) instead of the U.S. Social Security Number (SSN) when applying for credit cards.

Indeed, if your SIN were to match an existing SSN of an American resident, you would be committing identity theft here, which can be dramatic for the person from whom you are “borrowing” the SSN!

If you don’t have an SSN for your US credit cards applications, you may need an ITIN: the Individual Taxpayer Identification Number as we will see below. This will allow you to apply for credit cards from other institutions outside of American Express and can greatly facilitate your application process.

The key to starting credit cards applications in the United States is to have held an American Express card in Canada for at least 90 days.

If not, check out this page to find the best American Express Credit Card that can meet your needs.

Choose your first U.S. credit cards wisely. Remember that you will be starting from scratch on your credit report.

Therefore, it will be advisable to start with a credit card that you will keep for many years to improve your credit history. While the natural choice might be to go for a credit card with no annual fee, you’ll see further down the road that it’s also possible to start differently.

Also, be aware that one issuer monitors the number of credit cards on your credit report: Chase. A rule has been established: 5/24. This means that you will not be able to get credit cards from Chase if you have opened more than 5 credit cards in the last 24 months from any one issuer.

One way to avoid this: corporate credit cards. Most of these cards are not on your credit report and therefore do not fall under the 5/24 rule.

Before you begin your first U.S. credit card application, you will need to have a U.S. mailing address.

Two solutions:

• Friends or family in the United States
• A mail forwarding service

This is by far the simplest and safest solution. If your friends or family agree, use their mailing address as your U.S. address.

Even better: ask them to add you to their electricity account in order to have a document that “proves” you live there!

Your credit cards envelopes will arrive directly at this address and you can ask them to send them to you in Canada (while asking them to take pictures of the cards so that you can use them immediately on the Internet or through Apple Pay).

This is the solution I chose with friends in San Francisco after experimenting with mail forwarding services for a while.

In 2017, there were several mail forwarding services such as Mymallbox. But since then, most of these services have been excluded by the credit cards companies and reported as “Commercial Mail Receiving Agency” to the USPS.

The only solution that always seems to work is 24/7 Parcel, explained here by Ricky from Prince Of Travel.

This company is located in Niagara Falls and charges an annual fee of US$90 to rent a mailbox. And you will pay a reasonable fee of $2 to $3 to get every piece of mail forwarded to Canada.

You also need a bank account in the United States in US Dollars.

The top 3 banks providing cross-border services are RBC, CIBC and TD. Desjardins also offers to open an account at a Florida branch of Desjardins Bank. But the process is only done in a branch (in Canada or Florida) and the costs are significant.

Having most of my accounts at TD, it made sense for me to deal through TD. Please note that you do not need to be an existing TD customer in Canada to open an account with TD Bank USA (but it will make the process much easier).

The account will be opened directly with TD Bank U.S.A. via this link. You will then be presented with a page asking you in which state you wish to open your account and your status (US or Canadian resident).

I personally chose to open my account in Burlington, Vermont. Please note that you will not have to take any local steps: everything will be done online, by mail or by phone.

Once you have defined the state and city, you will need to choose the type of account. I chose the “TD Convenience” basic account: as long as you keep $100 US on it, there are no fees!

You then follow the different steps to get your account. At the end of the process, write down your account information so that you can make an initial deposit of US$100 to avoid any fees!

See this page for TD Bank USA Routing numbers.

In order to pay your credit cards bills, you will need to go through your new U.S. bank account.

You may very well choose to use your Canadian bank account to fund this U.S. bank account. But generally the (transfer and conversion) fees will be much less advantageous than those provided by other providers (as you will see below).

After I had also looked at the various services and rates/fees on offer, I decided on Transferwise. Moreover, when we talk about it on the Facebook group, many readers also trust this service.

Take a look at the example of a transfer of CA$1,000. Once the fee is withdrawn from Transferwise (CA $9.90 for this transfer amount), you will get US$770.50. Note that this rate is locked for 48 hours!

See what the market rate was at the time of writing this article (consulted on xe.com):

We really appreciate the transparency of Transferwise: the rate displayed is the market rate and the fees charged for the service provided are clear!

And for the record, what was the rate TD offered for a transfer from my Canadian account?

Please note that here, the rate displayed by TD includes the fee charged by the bank. In the end, compared to Transferwise, you lose about $13 when trading via TD! Imagine for a bigger amount!

Once you have your mailing address, your bank account and your American Express Canada credit card in hand, you can finally apply for for your first credit card in the United States!

The first solution available to you is the procedure through Nova Credit with American Express.

Once you have chosen an American Express credit card (see the Recommended Cards section), and start your application, open the Social Security Number field.

It will be possible to check the box I’ve had a credit card or loan in the UK, India, Mexico, Canada or Australia.

The Social Security Number will then become optional!

Once all the fields have been filled in, you can proceed.

After a few seconds, you’ll get to this page:

Here begins the search for your credit report in Canada through the service chosen by American Express: Nova Credit.

You will need to choose the country in which you think you have a credit report.

Let’s choose Canada:

Then, fill in the requested information.

Even if the Canadian social insurance number is optional, I advise you to indicate it so that your information can be easily retrieved by Nova.

We then provide our most recent Canadian address.

Then Nova is given permission to go to Transunion Canada to interview.

If all goes well, Nova will have found a credit report at Transunion Canada!

To make sure it is the right credit report, Nova will ask you 3 questions, just like when you apply for credit in Canada.

Once you have correctly answered the 3 questions, the file is then transferred to American Express USA who will contact you!

The beauty of it: once this step has been completed, you will receive by email, free of charge, your complete Transunion credit file!

You will need to download it within 72 hours from Nova’s website.

Audrey’s was, for example, 45 pages long, with an annotation for American Express USA: “The risk profile of this applicant is very low“.

It has recently decreased from 800 to 763, after 3 applications last month. No worries, in 3 months, it will be up in the 790-810 ?

Several outcomes may occur:

• either you are immediately approved – or within 24-48 hours
• either you will receive a letter indicating that additional documentation will be required

I advise you to call American Express USA and switch to the Global Transfer process described below.

Alternatively, still with American Express: the Global Transfer process.

Details of the American Express Global Transfer can be found on this page or in the capture below.

Note that American Express USA asks for information on:

• Your current (Canadian) American Express card number
• Your address in the United States
• Your U.S. phone number (a Canadian number works)
• Your U.S. bank account
• Your passport, SSN or ITIN
• Your job information

Now you understand why we needed to do all of the above for the U.S. address and U.S. bank account.

American Express USA will verify all information, including banking information (by calling your bank in the United States).

Regarding employment information, just mention that you will be transferred to the United States by your employer.

Personally, I gave my Canadian employment information and had no problems.

After a few months, you can apply for other American Express cards. It is important to continue to spend regularly on your American Express Credit cards or you will not be able to apply for new cards!

The choice is vast. Here are the two favourites that I plan to keep even though their costs are high: the benefits provided by Hilton Honors and Marriott Bonvoy more than compensate for them every year.

• Hilton Honors American Express Aspire Card
• Marriott Bonvoy Brilliant™ American Express^® Card

After clicking on the Apply button, feel free to check the“View All Cards With A Referral Offer” link to see all the referral options available to you.

After 2 to 3 American Express cards, it will be time to switch to cards from other issuers, including Chase (in order not to violate the 5/24 rule mentioned in the introduction).

For this new step, you will need an Individual Taxpayer Identification Number (ITIN).

The Individual Taxpayer Identification Number (ITIN) is a 9-digit number like the Social Security Number (SSN).

It allows the US Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to identify individuals who cannot have a SSN.

Thus, any non-U.S. citizen can still sell products in the U.S. and receive income that will be taxable to the IRS. Hence the need to issue an ITIN for these people.

In order to obtain an ITIN, you can take the steps yourself. Or call in a specialist service.

You will need to provide 3 documents to the IRS in order to be issued an ITIN:

• A W-7 Form
• Proof of identity
• A letter signed by a holding agent: this is the intermediary who will validate that you actually need an ITIN to transact through them.

The W-7 Form will allow you to submit an ITIN claim for the IRS. You can download it from this address.

Here’s how to fill it out:

• Check “Apply for a New ITIN“.
• Check the reason “h” with: Exception 1(d) – Royalty Income
• Enter the treaty: TIA 11087
• Fill in the other personal information
• Then date and sign with your phone number.
• Save it and print it

This is what it looks like:

There are two ways to do this:

• Send your passport with your W-7 form
• Send a certified copy of your passport

It’s best to choose the certified copy of the passport!

You will have to show up in person at one of Passport Canada’s main offices. A fee of $45 will be charged and your passport will be held for approximately 1 week before it is returned to you along with the certified true copy by registered mail.

Of course, ask for the certification to be done in English!

When I did it in 2017, I went through Smashwords. This method no longer works.

There is another method through Amazon that still seems to work for some members of the milesopedia community. Simply download and fill out the document you will find on this page.

Then attach it to your ITIN application.

But if you prefer to be sure of your move and not waste time in steps that could prove unsuccessful, you will have to choose a paying service to help you get an ITIN.

Jayce from Pointsnerd recommends the services of US Tax Resources. Although I myself have not needed to try them, I know several people who have received good service from this company.

For $249.99 + taxes, you will get:

• A completed W7 form (without the risk of error that could waste your time with the IRS)
• A tax notice from the United States
• Instructions for all procedures

Once you have your documents in hand, you will be able to send your ITIN request to the IRS at the following address:

Internal Revenue Service
ITIN Operation
P.O Box 149342
Austin, TX 78714-9342

It should take about 2 months before you receive your ITIN in the mail from the IRS.

Getting your first American credit card through American Express is not particularly complicated. Of the entire process, the ITIN stage is the most tedious and time-consuming.

Don’t hesitate to come discuss your efforts to get American credit cards in the Facebook group!

Here are our referral links for various US credit cards:

• American Express EveryDay Card
• Hilton Honors American Express Card
• Hilton Honors American Express Surpass Card
• Hilton Honors American Express Aspire Card
• Marriott Bonvoy Business™ American Express^® Card
• Marriott Bonvoy Brilliant™ American Express^® Card