Question on FICO score

[JasperFrank]

I have an 840+ score also. Online bank portal lets me check it for free. I have never carried a loan of any kind, aside from using and always paying off the C-Cards.

 

[Jstpssng]

My CU and bank each offers credit monitoring now... I didn't even sign up for it. Yesterday I received a notice that TransUnion reported I have a delinquent account, causing my score to drop 53 points. WTF?!?!!

Upon probing further it shows that I defaulted on a balance of $0.00, and $0.00 was overdue. I contacted the bank and they said that TransUnion had a glitch which affected many others besides me and they were working to fix it. No big deal to me but if somebody was trying to close on a house when this came up it could be a problem.

 

[ultrarunner]

Excellent point when errors happen it's not that big a deal when business is the one with the errors.

 

[bdhsfz6]

When I got my first job at 17, I opened a checking account with my father as guarantor. Almost immediately, checks began to bounce. My father called me a bunch of names and threatened to have the account closed until we found out it was the banks fault.

The exact same thing happened a year later with the same bank. I can just imagine what my credit score would have been after those incidents.

 

[ultrarunner]

I opened checking account at 16 with a nod from my dad... the bank had no problem with me opening a savings account alone when I started cashing my weekly paycheck age 13 but checking was different.

The first check I wrote bounced and dad was upset to put it mildly... he said irresponsible!

I showed him I had plenty to cover but then my account went to zero.

We both went in and spoke to the manager... turns out the account number I was given was somehow tied to back taxes and the IRS had all my money!

The bank had it cleared up by the end of the day but it was not easy having done nothing wrong to see Dad so upset..

 

[M59]

This is driving me bat crap crazy....

If you average about 3-4K a month in credit card bills, and they are always paid off on time, but then for a couple of months have a 10K credit card bill (likewise paid off in full before due), would that lower your FICO score?

Sigarms,

First, excellent forum ID from someone who owns many 936s. One for each vehicle.

FICO score/ credit rating scores have some serious problems and your increasing decreasing FICO score based on percentage of credit usage, albeit fully paid off each credit cycle, is a major identified problem and one that may be part of a class action lawsuit. Credit rating agencies do NOT include as part of their rating calculation timely full payment each credit cycle as part of their credit use calculation even though they profess to compute credit ratings based upon a users ability to properly manage credit usage which actuality is the ability to not get behind in credit payments or be constantly running a credit balance by paying the minimum due.

In the big picture a FICO score is only relevant is the following cases
1 Insurers use it to calculate insurance premiums
2 Mortgage, auto loans, and credit card issuers use it to calculate interest rate.

My personal credit score went from 800ish to low 700ish when I sold my business due to "no" weekly reportable income since I'm no longer part of workforce even though the sale generated a large capital gain. This is another significant problem with FICO calculation.

Shifting company expenses from your personal to a company issued credit card will reduce the monthly percentage credit used and will improve your personal score BUT this is only relevant if your credit score drops below 700 since 700 is roughly the breakpoint for extension of preferred credit rates.

In some ways, the FICO or credit scores are a racket because credit issuers are lazy and don't want to individually evaluate each credit requestor for financial liquidity and credit issuers want to shift credit users into higher interest brackets thus plumping up their bottom lines.

ps. My wife, who shifted from paid employment to running the household 37 years ago has twice the credit limit that I personally have. Makes no sense since the monthly payments come out of the same bucket.

pps. I'm dinged on my credit score because I have "too much available credit" per credit rating agencies even though I pay in full each month.

Hope this helps

 

[ultrarunner]

Don't overlook credit reporting when applying to rent...

 

[garry1p]

Several years ago I called one of the reporting agencies and asked why my score was always so low.
They said it was because I had no mortgage payments. DUH my house was paid off.

I was dinged last year for a one time $4000 CC charged that was paid off at the end of the month.
I think I went from 832 to 815.

If you have a low score a car loan officer told me they take someone with a low score and bundle their application with others that have a higher score and can usually get the loan approved that way,

 

[Jstpssng]

I think I went from 832 to 815

That's very temporary though; it should go back the following month.