Credit card rejected even with 780 CIBIL score — what am I missing?

Question

Hi everyone, I'm Pooja, working in Bangalore as a software tester, take home is around ₹52k per month. My CIBIL score is 780 which I thought was pretty decent. Applied for HDFC Regalia last month and got rejected. No reason given properly, just a generic 'does not meet eligibility criteria' message. I have no existing loans, one old credit card (Axis Flipkart card, limit ₹40k), pay all bills on time. Never missed a payment in 3 years. I'm genuinely confused — 780 should be good enough right? Is it my salary? Is it the card I chose? Did I apply too soon after something? I checked my CIBIL report and there's no error that I can see. Could the bank have some internal blacklist or something? Should I just try a different bank or wait? Has anyone else faced this with HDFC specifically? Really frustrated because I don't even know what to fix here.

Answer 1

Honestly, CIBIL score is only one piece of the puzzle. Banks have their own internal scoring systems on top of CIBIL — HDFC especially is known for being strict this way. A 780 gets you in the door, but it doesn't guarantee approval. Let me tell you what's likely going wrong here.

First — salary. ₹52k in hand for HDFC Regalia is borderline. Regalia typically wants ₹1 lakh+ in hand or an existing HDFC relationship. That card is genuinely a premium product and they're picky about it. This is probably your main issue.

Second — your credit profile is thin. One card with ₹40k limit, no loans, 3 years of history. Banks call this a 'thin file.' Your score is good but there's not much data for them to feel confident about giving you a high-limit premium card.

Third — the thing most people get wrong — they don't check if they had too many hard inquiries recently. Every time you apply for credit, it shows on your CIBIL report. Even one or two extra applications in 6 months can trigger rejection at conservative banks like HDFC.

What you should actually do:

Don't apply to multiple cards right now. Every rejection adds a hard inquiry and makes things worse. Wait at least 3-4 months.

Open a savings account with HDFC if you don't have one. Salary account especially. HDFC gives preferential treatment to their own account holders. Even a 6-month old HDFC relationship changes how they look at your application.

Apply for a more appropriate card first — try SBI SimplyCLICK or Amazon Pay ICICI. These are easier to get at your income level and will thicken your credit profile over the next 12 months.

After that, reapply for Regalia or try HDFC Millennia which has lower income requirements.

Also raise a limit increase request on your Axis card. A higher limit with low utilization actually improves your score over time.

My recommendation — go get the Amazon Pay ICICI card right now (no joining fee, good cashback, ICICI is relatively easy to approve). Use it for 12 months alongside your Axis card, keep utilization under 30%, then go back to HDFC. You'll get approved easily at that point.

Answer 2

Gopal's advice is solid but I'd push back slightly on one thing — I don't think the salary is the main issue here. ₹52k in hand is low for Regalia, yes, but HDFC also looks at gross salary not just in-hand. If your CTC is around ₹7-8 LPA, that's actually within Regalia's range depending on the branch.

What I think actually happened — HDFC has an internal negative list of pincode areas, employers, and even certain professions that get auto-flagged. Software testers at smaller companies sometimes get lower internal scores even if CIBIL is fine. It's not fair but it's real.

Also, your Axis Flipkart card having only ₹40k limit signals to HDFC that Axis also didn't give you high credit exposure. Banks look at what other banks trusted you with.

Here's what I'd actually suggest differently — instead of starting over with a new bank, call HDFC credit card helpline and ask specifically for the rejection reason codes. They're legally supposed to share this under RBI guidelines. Sometimes it's something super fixable like address mismatch or employer not in their approved list.

If employer is the issue, nothing much you can do short-term except switch jobs or wait for a bigger company on your resume.

If it's salary or limit related, go apply for HDFC MoneyBack or HDFC Millennia instead — much lower bar. Once you have an HDFC card for 12 months, upgrade to Regalia through a product upgrade request. That's the cleanest path and avoids another hard inquiry on your report.

Don't just keep trying random cards — be strategic about it.