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Buffering and Deduplication of Credit Card Inquiries Research Project

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JLK93
Established Contributor

Re: Bait & Switch advertizing ! ! !


@Revelate wrote:

@JLK93 wrote:

I don't see how anyone can study the examples I've provided and not see a pattern. My last test included 5 cards. It is carefully documented. There was a buffer period and then minimal score loss. The conclusion is clear. Maybe on it's own it could be doubted, but it is consisten with my other examples. I provided 3 examples of dedupes and all of the examples included buffered inquires. Buffering and deduping have always gone together. Perhaps someone can skim the data and not see the pattern.

 

There should be more tests. I have been trying for several monthsl to get testers. However, for months I have found no one willing to give up an inquiry for a test.

 

I've been watching my inquiries age off for the last year. Every inquiry from 1 to 6 was scored individually on every Bureau. There was absolutely no evidence of binning. The only exception was EX98. In that case the first 3 inquiries were scored individually and the aging of 4 through 6 caused no point gain. Inquiry #1 on EX98 was worth approximately 20 points IIRC.

 

Some on the people who have observed binning in the past may not have been aware some many credit card inquiries are being deduped. They may have actually observing actually observing something different than they thought. 


I think either binning or de-dupe explains the data in both scenarios but I might've not read it closely enough.  Mea culpa to be sure I have a bunch of crap going on right now, and FICO has been patently clear that credit card inquiries are counted seperately.  I'm going to be going through a likely spree in a bit which is going to land several inquiries on EX and I don't mind it tracking it if you have a test plan that can be provided.

 

Actually I may have pretty good data from my most recent app spree on Equifax which is the most granular in my experience of the 3 monitoring solutions, this is all FICO 8, I'll see if I can dig out some FICO 5 datapoints too which I might have from DCU:

 

The inquiry dates are specific to the date of the inquiry, balance updates are there for completeness and to isolate possible grace periods and are the date the monitoring solution saw them.

 

5/3/16: 714->714 pull by Credco for mortgage refinance, absolutely grace period on my prior data during mortgage process

5/4/16: 714->714 minus one balance -> $0

5/14/16: 714->717 for a balance increase, so something else happened here

5/16/16: 717->717 pull by Factual Data for the HELOC, should be grace period/dedupe as it was during mortgage and is coded identically

~5/20/16: 717->714 balance change, $0->$21 number of tradelines with balances breakpoint

~5/27/16: 714->714 small balance to small balance, no change as a result but for tracking grace periods or what not

6/1 report pull: 714

6/4 report pull: 713 (the Credco inquiry should be counting now)

~6/14/16: 713->713 small balance to small balance

~6/19/16: 713->716 balance change $21->$0, number with revolvers with balances again

6/20/16: 716->710 when Discover pulled

6/25/16: 710->708 when Citibank pulled 

 

These last two is where it all falls apart for both dedupe and grace period on my data.  The 5/16 pull should've counted by 6/16 but I'm not certain it did (I can't explain why I lost a point before that exactly) but any way it's sliced the Discover and Citibank should not have both counted if deduped, and they shouldn't have had an immediate effect.  Doesn't look good for binning either frankly but I'm willing to suggest something else might've changed on one of the two.

 

On the flipside EX FICO 8: 6/11 721->721 when Chase pulled and that one is absolutely coded as credit card and I didn't take a drop after 30 days either so that is one datapoint in support of binning.

 

I and others aren't trying to be argumentative (at least I'm not) but when there's conflicting data and we have FICO stating a thing explicitly, it's reasonable to question the data as it would be in any remotely scientific process.


As I already pointed out, Chase and Citi inquiries should have an immediate impact. Most of my data is for BofA, Barclays and Synchrony on Transunion and Capital One and Credit Unions on Equifax. I don't have data for Discover.

 

I have virtually no data for Experian. I have always had more than 6 inquiries on Experian, so, the new inquiries never had an effect. There was one rare moment when I dropped down to 5 on Experian and my next Citi inquiry caused an immediate impact.

 

I no problem with conflicting data. I have been trying to get data for months. Actually, much longer than that. I never said that all credit card inquiries were buffered and deduped. I showed clear evidence that all of the inquiries I have taken on Tranunion and Equifax over the last 2 years were buffered and whenever there was more than one, they were deduped. May primary and only goal in finally posting my data was shake some data out of the wood pile.

 

When I spend a lot of time and effort researching and accumulating data, I do have a problem with posters saying it can't be true because FICO doesn't say it is true, or it can't be true or other people would have seen it long ago. It consider both statements meaningless.

 

In a couple of weeks I will post my data showing each of my inquiries being scored separately as they aged. I have already compiled the data into tables. I just don't currently have time to post it.

Message 41 of 90
Revelate
Moderator Emeritus

Re: Bait & Switch advertizing ! ! !

Well after this interview process wraps up I'm basically alone for the holidays and other than presumably sorting my passport and prepping for teaching a class in early January I don't have much going on.

 

I can try dig out more data over the years and nail down the specifics as to their coding (I'm not sure if it's all in the coding or a two step coding + organization name on the dedupe / grace period, I had some reported as miscellaneous but they absolutely followed the mortgage dedupe and processing), EQ is by far my best data source, less good on both TU and EX.  




        
Message 42 of 90
Anonymous
Not applicable

Yes, it is: Bait & Switch advertizing ! ! !

 

JLK93 wrote:
12-19-2016 06:07 PM


. . I never said that all credit card inquiries were buffered and deduped.

 

* * * * But you did say:

 

dramatic headline"FICO Will Combine Hard Pulls for Your Next App Spree!"

 

 

It is a little known fact that most credit card inquiries, taken in a short period of time, will be counted as 1 for FICO scoring purposes.

 

Therefore, it is possible to take a large number of inquiries and only lose as few as 3 points.

 

Inquiries from B of A, Barclays, Synchrony, Capital One, virtually all Credit Unions, probably Amex and others will be combined for scoring purposes.

 

This means that by strategically planning your app sprees, it is possible to lose only a few points.

 

For example, an app spree consisting of BofA, Barclays, Synchrony and several Transunion pulling Credit Unions could only cost you points.

There is no need for the shopping card trick. You can get better cards with little point loss.

I recently took  4 CLI hard pulls and on credit card app hard pull. There was no change in my scores for 31 days.

At that time the hard pulls were scored as 1.

 

 

JLK93 wrote:
12-19-2016 06:07 PM


. . . .When I spend a lot of time and effort researching and accumulating data, I do have a problem with posters saying it can't be true

 

 

* My Comment: This may happen when "a" Unicorn jumps over a Rainbow,

but will NOT happen for the Vast Majority of people.

.

.

 


@JLK93 wrote:

@Revelate wrote:

@JLK93 wrote:

I don't see how anyone can study the examples I've provided and not see a pattern. My last test included 5 cards. It is carefully documented. There was a buffer period and then minimal score loss. The conclusion is clear. Maybe on it's own it could be doubted, but it is consisten with my other examples. I provided 3 examples of dedupes and all of the examples included buffered inquires. Buffering and deduping have always gone together. Perhaps someone can skim the data and not see the pattern.

 

There should be more tests. I have been trying for several monthsl to get testers. However, for months I have found no one willing to give up an inquiry for a test.

 

I've been watching my inquiries age off for the last year. Every inquiry from 1 to 6 was scored individually on every Bureau. There was absolutely no evidence of binning. The only exception was EX98. In that case the first 3 inquiries were scored individually and the aging of 4 through 6 caused no point gain. Inquiry #1 on EX98 was worth approximately 20 points IIRC.

 

Some on the people who have observed binning in the past may not have been aware some many credit card inquiries are being deduped. They may have actually observing actually observing something different than they thought. 


I think either binning or de-dupe explains the data in both scenarios but I might've not read it closely enough.  Mea culpa to be sure I have a bunch of crap going on right now, and FICO has been patently clear that credit card inquiries are counted seperately.  I'm going to be going through a likely spree in a bit which is going to land several inquiries on EX and I don't mind it tracking it if you have a test plan that can be provided.

 

Actually I may have pretty good data from my most recent app spree on Equifax which is the most granular in my experience of the 3 monitoring solutions, this is all FICO 8, I'll see if I can dig out some FICO 5 datapoints too which I might have from DCU:

 

The inquiry dates are specific to the date of the inquiry, balance updates are there for completeness and to isolate possible grace periods and are the date the monitoring solution saw them.

 

5/3/16: 714->714 pull by Credco for mortgage refinance, absolutely grace period on my prior data during mortgage process

5/4/16: 714->714 minus one balance -> $0

5/14/16: 714->717 for a balance increase, so something else happened here

5/16/16: 717->717 pull by Factual Data for the HELOC, should be grace period/dedupe as it was during mortgage and is coded identically

~5/20/16: 717->714 balance change, $0->$21 number of tradelines with balances breakpoint

~5/27/16: 714->714 small balance to small balance, no change as a result but for tracking grace periods or what not

6/1 report pull: 714

6/4 report pull: 713 (the Credco inquiry should be counting now)

~6/14/16: 713->713 small balance to small balance

~6/19/16: 713->716 balance change $21->$0, number with revolvers with balances again

6/20/16: 716->710 when Discover pulled

6/25/16: 710->708 when Citibank pulled 

 

These last two is where it all falls apart for both dedupe and grace period on my data.  The 5/16 pull should've counted by 6/16 but I'm not certain it did (I can't explain why I lost a point before that exactly) but any way it's sliced the Discover and Citibank should not have both counted if deduped, and they shouldn't have had an immediate effect.  Doesn't look good for binning either frankly but I'm willing to suggest something else might've changed on one of the two.

 

On the flipside EX FICO 8: 6/11 721->721 when Chase pulled and that one is absolutely coded as credit card and I didn't take a drop after 30 days either so that is one datapoint in support of binning.

 

I and others aren't trying to be argumentative (at least I'm not) but when there's conflicting data and we have FICO stating a thing explicitly, it's reasonable to question the data as it would be in any remotely scientific process.


As I already pointed out, Chase and Citi inquiries should have an immediate impact. Most of my data is for BofA, Barclays and Synchrony on Transunion and Capital One and Credit Unions on Equifax. I don't have data for Discover.

 

I have virtually no data for Experian. I have always had more than 6 inquiries on Experian, so, the new inquiries never had an effect. There was one rare moment when I dropped down to 5 on Experian and my next Citi inquiry caused an immediate impact.

 

I no problem with conflicting data. I have been trying to get data for months. Actually, much longer than that. I never said that all credit card inquiries were buffered and deduped. I showed clear evidence that all of the inquiries I have taken on Tranunion and Equifax over the last 2 years were buffered and whenever there was more than one, they were deduped. May primary and only goal in finally posting my data was shake some data out of the wood pile.

 

When I spend a lot of time and effort researching and accumulating data, I do have a problem with posters saying it can't be true because FICO doesn't say it is true, or it can't be true or other people would have seen it long ago. It consider both statements meaningless.

 

In a couple of weeks I will post my data showing each of my inquiries being scored separately as they aged. I have already compiled the data into tables. I just don't currently have time to post it.


Message 43 of 90
newhis
Valued Contributor

HP is not the only thing

For me a spree is not something that most people do, so my guess is that the people that do it are not afraid of HP.

 

On a spree not only the HP can hurt your score. At least AAoA may hurt also.

 

Fico 8 is king, but there are other scores. New accounts hurt other scores more than Fico 8. I've learned that even the average credit limit is counted in some scores used for insurance purposes.

 

Let's see, I want to help a friend that has only 1 card for 6 years and I told him to go for a spree of 5 cards because HP no matter much, but how about AAoA going down from 6 years to 1 year? HP will be removed in 2 years from history but his AAoA will only be 3 years by then.

 

And from what I understand each HP is not related to certain number of points lost anyway. There are people with similar profiles with 10 HP or 70 HP in a year and have similar scores.

 

Anyway, I don't think it matters much if each HP is counted or they are grouped. That's only part of the score. A spree is not based on HP only.

Message 44 of 90
Anonymous
Not applicable

Re: HP is not the only thing

newhis,

 

IMO, AAoA impact usually isn't as big as most make it out to be.  In your example above, you mentioned someone only having 1 card for 6 years.  I think this example is very rare outside of a 19 year old that got his first CC and then went 6 years using only that line of credit.  Chances are, however, that this individual would have scooped up an auto loan along the way, school loan(s), something else anyway.  And, that's someone that's 19.  If you're talking people into their 20's/30's and beyond the chances of having a greater AAoA are going to naturally increase.  For people with extremely thin/young files, sure a spree can have an impact on AAoA but I think more often than not AAoA is somewhat established for many.  My file is moderately thick/aged, and after going on a spree last summer my AAoA didn't drop a single year; it was 7 years before the spree and 7 years after the spree and all the new accounts reported. 

 

I just think it's wise to steer those that are new or relatively new to credit away from sprees moreso than those that have established files that haven't applied for credit in a while. 

Message 45 of 90
Revelate
Moderator Emeritus

Re: HP is not the only thing

The rationale for a spree anyway is that it minimizes damage over time.  Have to take some unfortunate credit for changing the opinion of sprees around here but what I suggested does hold, illustration on a new file (assuming all on same bureau for the inquiry):

 

1 account every six months (which was the prevailing mantra in 2012):

0 months: 1 account, 0 months age of oldest account, 0 months age newest account, 1 inquiry within a year, 0 months AAOA

6 months: 2 accounts, 6 months age of oldest account, 0 months age newest account, 2 inquiries within a year, 3 months AAOA

12 months: 3 accounts, 1 year age of oldest account, 0 months age of newest account, 2 inquiries within a year, 6 months AAOA

 

Spree, 3 accounts right now:

0 months: 3 accounts, 0 months age of oldest account, 0 months age newest account, 3 inquiries within a year, 0 months AAOA

6 months: 3 accounts, 6 months age of oldest account, 6 months age newest account, 3 inquiries within a year, 6 months AAOA

12 months: 3 accounts, 1 year age of oldest account, 1 year age of newest account, 0 inquiries within a year, 1 year AAOA

 

It should be pretty clear the second file is way better at the 1 year mark, and it does extend to thicker / prettier files too; the fact is if you are going to take a negative in the FICO algorithm, since it's all time dependent anyway, take that negative right now and get it aging immediately.

 

I'm of the opinion people should ignore HP's anyway, if you need or even want (without being dumb) the account don't worry about the FICO impact unless you have a  potential mortgage app in the near future (1 year); HP's are just the cost of leveraging your credit file, and everyone should be doing that to their financial advantage.  Dedupe / grace period is an intellectual exercise, and I need a lot more data around the specific coding to be convinced of that and I will still stand by my claim that inquiry bins do exist certainly on some models (I don't know how you explain my EQ FICO 5 data otherwise but I'm open to suggestions and admittedly it could have changed for FICO 8 or prettier files; also the old data was all on EQ FICO 5 as well) but if it can further our knowledge of the algorithm to either prove or disprove it I'm all for the discussion... just hopefully without us resorting to our inner 12 year olds Cat Tongue

 




        
Message 46 of 90
newhis
Valued Contributor

Re: HP is not the only thing

@BrutalBodyShots, I agree with you:

“I just think it's wise to steer those that are new or relatively new to credit away from sprees moreso than those that have established files that haven't applied for credit in a while.”

 

I have seen some people getting 10 or more store cards with $200 limit on each, then regretting it.

 

@Revelate, good points as always.

In your example, what do you expect the difference between the 2 about SL and APR (or other 0% promo)?

 

I think I’m a moderate just between the 2 scenarios. Started with 2 cards, then 1 at 7 months, another with SCT at 8 months, then few others that I wanted. DW almost the same. Less than 3 years later our FICO 8 is at 800. All of our cards are 5K or higher.

 

 

I didn’t know about credit in the USA 3 years ago, I lost 2 years before that because I didn’t know it was possible to get a secured card without SSN/ITIN and start building history or even get a card as AU.

 

For me it is all about your goals. Why do you want X cards? What is your goal score? Do you care about APR? Card limit? SP CLI? Then create a plan.

 

I don’t understand sprees with new file, because you get a lot of cards with low limits, high APR that are not useful or are difficult to make them grow. I can’t go into a spree with my file because I can’t meet the spending requirements for the welcome bonus. That’s why I apply only when a card is very good, like CSR.

Message 47 of 90
Revelate
Moderator Emeritus

Re: HP is not the only thing

You're sort of expected to throw away your initial accounts at some point anyway when talking new files (unless you're like me and trying to old onto oldest account for dear life heh), and the math does hold when we're talking thick files adding 3 more accounts too so the CL argument isn't truly relevant.

 

CL extensions are about income, assets, spend, prevailing economic conditions, marketing, relationship, lender portfolio management... I could go on but I think you get the idea, only a small part is FICO, and somewhat on current lines which I still see anecdotally reported during "my CSR said..." statements.

 

You can game that in a number of ways, I plopped down $5K in a BOFA secured card (that I knew would graduate at some point) and then sorted it with an Amex and their most excellent 3X CLI policy which back then took me to a 9K tradeline at 1 year 9 months into my build... though I did take the moonshot for 25K at 2 years 3 months and didn't get it haha.  I still subscribe to simply getting an account with a CLI friendly lender: Amex, Discover at times, Synchrony, etc either at the outset or at the 1 year mark and then push it for all it's worth for the 2 year mark apps (if I were building a file again on a rigorous plan).  These days you might be able to sort a CSR at year 1 anyway, lender UW is really loose these days on CC's.

 

I would certainly suggest on my illustration you have a better shot at getting a good limit extension on the spree case at the 1 year mark but so many other factors go into it, it's really hard to state.

 

Once you get to portfolio complete then you can sit back and cherry pick... but if you don't have the file to support it, you're not going to get approved for the CSR anyway; my strategies simply are tailored to get above the FICO hurdle for said CSR (or similar) in the quickest manner possible.




        
Message 48 of 90
Anonymous
Not applicable

Re: HP is not the only thing

Good information above from Revelate regarding sprees and the math associated with a spree verses opening up the same number of accounts over time.

 

I will add to what he said one advantage and one disadvantage of a spree, however, and these points are sort of intangeables as they can't really be quantified with math.

 

Advantage:  In apping all at once, the different creditors will not see all of the other new accounts (as they haven't reported yet).  Conversely, if you app for the same number of accounts over a period of time every X months, by the time you get to the last account they'll be able to see all of the new accounts and could give you a denial based on "too many new accounts" or something similar.

 

Disadvantage:  Sort of a spinoff of the advantage I just gave above, your CURRENT creditors (pre-spree) could get spooked by an app spree as it could be viewed as a desperate move to obtain lots of credit.  As a result, in theory they could take AA which could result in CLDs or possibly even having an account closed. 

 

In both of these examples I gave above, the stronger one's profile the less either of them matters.  If you're talking someone with low 600's scores though, either of the points I made above could very well apply.  I guess there are 2 rules when it comes to sprees.  One, don't do it if you plan on applying for a mortgage in the next year or two and two, don't do it if your profile is relatively weak.  One should consider having at least a reasonably solid profile prior to sprees, IMO.

Message 49 of 90
Revelate
Moderator Emeritus

Re: HP is not the only thing


@Anonymous wrote:

 

 

Disadvantage:  Sort of a spinoff of the advantage I just gave above, your CURRENT creditors (pre-spree) could get spooked by an app spree as it could be viewed as a desperate move to obtain lots of credit.  As a result, in theory they could take AA which could result in CLDs or possibly even having an account closed. 

 


That was a 2010 concern.

 

Which suggests go get your new accounts right now just in case the fecal matter gets thrown at the air ciculation device again Smiley Happy.




        
Message 50 of 90
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