@NoNonsense wrote:
@user5387 wrote:A couple of things here.
For scoring purposes, FICO looks at the proportion of cards with balances, so it's worth keeping tabs on this.
For CLI purposes, your CC company knows your spending, so in a narrow sense there's no value to letting a balance report. However, it's possible that they've done some internal analysis and determined that people who let balances report are closer to the point where they start to carry a balance, and thus pay interest. This would be valuable to the CC companies.
Monthly payment amounts are listed on your reports, so other CC companies will know your spending as well.
A couple of interesting things in what you say. Yes, it wouldn't surprise me if, as you say, it's quite possible there is a study out there that links current customers who let post a balance with future customers who end up paying interest. It's kind of logical. So, they would look with a little more sympathy at those kinds of customers.
Your last point, though, relates to my current strategy. The analyst of Credit Card "A" would, of course, know all my spending with their credit card, before Statement Cut or after, makes no difference. BUT, she will only know my spending with credit cards B,C, D or E if I let those cards post a balance. If I don't, the analyst wouldn't know if I even used those cards at all, in any given month. Right?
I have been operating under the belief that such analyst, considering a CLI for example, would "love" to see plenty of activity everywhere, as long as it's controlled (in utilization) and with no minimum payments or other payment issues.
Well, they would know your last payment amount each month with cards B, C, D and E. But if you are like me and often pay either multiple times per month, or pay part of each statement balance from multiple bank accounts, then the payment amount can be less than the amount you charged each month.
@NoNonsense wrote:Your last point, though, relates to my current strategy. The analyst of Credit Card "A" would, of course, know all my spending with their credit card, before Statement Cut or after, makes no difference. BUT, she will only know my spending with credit cards B,C, D or E if I let those cards post a balance. If I don't, the analyst wouldn't know if I even used those cards at all, in any given month. Right?
I have been operating under the belief that such analyst, considering a CLI for example, would "love" to see plenty of activity everywhere, as long as it's controlled (in utilization) and with no minimum payments or other payment issues.
Somewhat correct but not entirely. On my EX report for example, an analysis can see the recent high balance and recent payment on my other cards, even those which report a 0 balance. As for the score, for me, one card reporting less than 9% total utl optimizes my score. If I let another card report even 1%, my score goes down 5 points. If I let another one report another 1%, I take another 5 point hit. If I let all cards report 0, I take a 7 point hit.
@lg8302ch wrote:I have done this test when I had 8 cards (before my last app) and tried to challenge ScoreWatch
My overal util is less than 10% in both of my tests so I can only answer for results with low util. First test was reporting 1 account with 70% util but overal util of 4% and my score was 802. The next month I made sure I let 8 accounts of 8 report a 1$ balance and my score dropped to 738. Reason for the drop according Fico - too many accounts with a balance. So for me it did not matter the high util on a single card at all as long as overal util stayed low. The total open debt on my 2nd test was 8$ (1$ on each account) and this resulted in an incredible drop of my Fico score. That was a very interesting experience and from this experience it would be better to let the 250$ report on 1 account instead of spreading it around.
But that is not what I am doing because I do not care about my score unless I want to app and much rather get the best rewards out of my cards
(this is only in terms of score - no clue about CLIs)
How long did it take for your scores to regain from that beating..lol
@lg8302ch wrote:I have done this test when I had 8 cards (before my last app) and tried to challenge ScoreWatch
But that is not what I am doing because I do not care about my score unless I want to app and much rather get the best rewards out of my cards
(this is only in terms of score - no clue about CLIs)
That's one of the most informative posts I've read here in a while. It mirrors my experience although
I wasn't as precise on my record keeping. I only have 4 cc's. When I allow a < 10% balance to report
On 3~4 of them, My scores are around 800. With balances tuned to report only 1 card at 3% I score
830~840.
It would be interesting to know if the important factors are percentage of open accounts reporting a
balance, or raw number of accounts reporting a balance or some combination.
One thing it highlights is the tendency of forum members to have a high number of open card
accounts makes them vulnerable to reporting balances (even $1 balances apparently) and
reducing the month's score. Apparently there isn't much score benefit to having a lot of credit
card accounts since I've been able to come within 10 points of the maximum 850 with only 4
open credit cards and one active mortgage - 5 accounts total.
My personal philosophy is to keep my open accounts pared down to just what I need/use. I also
generally PIF on the due date and don't care about the score hit for reporting balances. Life is alot
easier for me with few accounts on autopay and once your AAoA gets up there it's easy to get CL's
that accommodate even the highest month's spend and stay with 10% utilization. The information
available here about tweaking reported balances for scoring increases is very interesting though.
I have to wonder that if it became a more widespread habit to maximize scores by these methods if
FICO and credit issuers wouldn't respond by tweaking the algorithms to reduce or eliminate the
benefit. 20~30 or more points is enough to move a great many people into/ out of approval range for
lots of credit products. After all, the idea is for FICO scores to be invisible to the people measured
and to give an accurate assessment of default risk. When FICO scores become an influence that
temporarily changes behavior without changing the underlying risk, the scores loose value. It is all
just idle speculation though, because the vast majority of consumers are totally oblivious to the
details on FICO scores.
+
850 FICO8 since 2015, Thanks MyFICO - 5+ years since last HP
@NoNonsense wrote:As for seeing last payment of cards that don't post a balance... What payment do they see? Because, as you know, many people in this boards, including me, sometimes pays several times a month, Do they see the accumulation of all those payments, do they see whatever payment happens to be the last one? That could be very deceiving information, if that is the case. What if you spend $500 with a card in a month, pay $450 before the Statement Cut, the PIF the other $50. What last payment do the analysts of other credit cards see? The last payment of the $50 or that and all the previous ones in the month?
Here is an example of a card that only has been open one month, one statement, High Balance $1066, Recent Payment $1207..the payments were a couple of payments just to see how long it took them to complete the transaction so it is an accumulation of multiple payments.
Another one, high balance $958, recent payments $1648. The high balance was from last month, not from previous months as the high balance has been much higher. Again, the payment amount is an accumulation of a couple of payments.
Just for reference, I just pulled these off my EX report.
@NoNonsense wrote:
@Blackrv7 wrote:Somewhat correct but not entirely. On my EX report for example, an analysis can see the recent high balance and recent payment on my other cards, even those which report a 0 balance. As for the score, for me, one card reporting less than 9% total utl optimizes my score. If I let another card report even 1%, my score goes down 5 points. If I let another one report another 1%, I take another 5 point hit. If I let all cards report 0, I take a 7 point hit.
I know about their ability to see any account's highest balance ever, I believe, right?
As for seeing last payment of cards that don't post a balance... What payment do they see? Because, as you know, many people in this boards, including me, sometimes pays several times a month, Do they see the accumulation of all those payments, do they see whatever payment happens to be the last one? That could be very deceiving information, if that is the case. What if you spend $500 with a card in a month, pay $450 before the Statement Cut, the PIF the other $50. What last payment do the analysts of other credit cards see? The last payment of the $50 or that and all the previous ones in the month?
I think it depends on the credit card company. heres an example from American Express. I paid in full every month, sometimes before, sometimes after statement cut:
Spend
Month 1: $576.27
Month 2: $183.99
Month 3: $1152.86
Month 4: $188.95
My Transunion report shows:
Balance Amount paid
$576 $0
$0 $0
$1152 $0
$0 $0
My Barclays card reports differently. If I pay after statement date, the payment shows up in the next month, if I make payments before the statement cuts, it gets added to current month. So often last months plus part of this months is added together, then the next month it appears that i paid less than the full amount because part of the payment was already credited in the prevous month, etc.
@credit-hunter wrote:
@lg8302ch wrote:I have done this test when I had 8 cards (before my last app) and tried to challenge ScoreWatch
But that is not what I am doing because I do not care about my score unless I want to app and much rather get the best rewards out of my cards
(this is only in terms of score - no clue about CLIs)
How long did it take for your scores to regain from that beating..lol
Fico has thank god no memory so I got it back the next month but since I applied for a new card in November the 800 mark is no longer possible for the moment but that is just a hobby I am perfectly fine with my scores as they are...LOL