Let balance post to CR or not before PIF

[Anonymous]

So I have a new NFCU CC with 10K limit, I did a BT from a CrapOne card for $400 and will pay that off next week. I plan on using this card for a side business I have where I will be able to charge up 4-5k and pay off right away. My question is to maximize FICO scoring AND appeal to creditors to get CLIs in the future should I let the high balance post THEN pay off? Should I partially pay off or just charge and then as soon as I can make a payment PIF. 

Myonly other debt is about $800 and leaving that on the card its on at 0% keeps my total util at about 7%

\TIA!

[Anonymous]

Following...I had this very question on the tip of my tongue earlier today, and I'm very interested in seeing some responses!

[ojefferyo]

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@Anonymous wrote:

So I have a new NFCU CC with 10K limit, I did a BT from a CrapOne card for $400 and will pay that off next week. I plan on using this card for a side business I have where I will be able to charge up 4-5k and pay off right away. My question is to maximize FICO scoring AND appeal to creditors to get CLIs in the future should I let the high balance post THEN pay off? Should I partially pay off or just charge and then as soon as I can make a payment PIF. 

Myonly other debt is about $800 and leaving that on the card its on at 0% keeps my total util at about 7%

\TIA!

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It would have just been easier to just pay the cap1 card instead of transfering it, just my opinion. But you could let the statment cut then pay it off.

[Anonymous]

It would have been but I included that in my app figuring it may help my chances. 

[bradlin]

High balance is reported. Not sure if it's an input in Fico scoring but it may well be. It's important if manually reviewed or you need to recon. I would let it report and then PIF. Oddly I have high balances in excess of my CL and Chase in particular seems to let you do it  they let me charge over $2k in excess of my CL with no fees then months later I got a CLI to cover that high balance - after I paid it down considerably. However that did not have to report to a CRA as their internal system would have known that anyway.

I'd say a human analyst would like to see you put $5k on it and you PIF.

[red259]

I got an auto cli on my freedom by running up the balance and PIF before statement cuts. So if you are trying to get a CLI on that particular card they will know how much you are using it and I see no reason to let a large balance report. Now if you are trying to get a CLI for other cards you may want to let the statement cut with a large balance once and then immediately PIF. I used to do this once with newer cards just to set a high mark. Its not something you would want to do month after month as your score will tank due to high util. At the moment since I am not applying for anything I have balances reporting all over the place and just keeping overall util to a reasonable amount, but when I am about two months away from an app cycle I become hyper vigilent to maximize credit score.