Fico 9 Experian....Consumer finance account?.

[Creasy]

My Experian Fico 9 score is about 35 points lower than my Experian 8 score. The Fico 9 score factors shows that I have a consumer finance account on my report but the Fico 8 factors does not mention me having a consumer finance account. I don't understand what they are considering a consumer finance account under Fico 9 vs Fico 8. My accounts are all from well known (non sub prime) lenders/banks or credit unions. Any one else have this issue or know how I can correct this....Thanks.  

[DollyLama]

Any store cards like Lowes or Home Depot?

[Anonymous]

Has this reason code only recently appeared?  This will help in tracking down the culprit.  (Of course, if this is the first time you have pulled your myFICO report, you won't know.)

[Anonymous]

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@DollyLama wrote:

Any store cards like Lowes or Home Depot?

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I don't think store cards would be viewed as a CFA under most circumstances.  OP, do you have any installment loans on your report (even if they are closed) for something you may have used in-store financing for?  Something like a furniture store, TV at Best Buy, etc?  A lot of the time something like this can be coded as a CFA even though it behaves like a typical installment loan.

[Creasy]

Nope, no store cards at all Dolly.

[Creasy]

CreditGuy it was the first time checking my Fico 9 reason codes. I've got a membership here at myfico and routinly check my Fico 8 score/reports and reason codes but I've never seen anything about a consumer finance account...Only under the Fico 9 reason codes does a CFA pop up.

[Creasy]

Brutal I have installment loans but non are from in-store financing...They're vehicle loans and bank personal loans. I have 10 credit cards and they all have a 0 balance on them. Could Fico 9 be considering a closed car loan account from Westlake Financial as a consumer finance account? It's my old car loan (I now have a different vehicle and loan thru another bank)....I'm not sure if Westlake Financial is considered a subprime lender. I assume if they were subprime they would have appeared as a consumer finance account under Fico 8 also correct? Thanks for all your help guys, appreciate it. 

[Anonymous]

On your credit report, does the "account type" say "installment loan" or does it say something else for the account in question?  Have you looked at your hard copy credit report, or only at the report provided by your monitoring service?  Sometimes there are slight variations.  I know I see variations on "account type" just between bureaus and even between monitoring services... like CK will say one thing and CCT will say another.  Your hard copy credit report when you request it sort of lets you know where you really stand though.

[Anonymous]

My comments in blue below.

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@Creasy wrote:

Brutal I have installment loans but non are from in-store financing...They're vehicle loans and bank personal loans. I have 10 credit cards and they all have a 0 balance on them. Could Fico 9 be considering a closed car loan account from Westlake Financial as a consumer finance account? It's my old car loan (I now have a different vehicle and loan thru another bank)....I'm not sure if Westlake Financial is considered a subprime lender.

This sounds to me like a real possibility.

I assume if they were subprime they would have appeared as a consumer finance account under Fico 8 also correct?

No.  It has not been shown that the FICO 8 model includes CFAs as a bad factor.  It might, but we are still looking for someone who can produce a reason code on the FICO 8 score for it.  We do know that it is part of older models.  And now we know it is part of FICO 9.

If you'd like a case study where FICO includes a factor as a penalty, then takes removes it altogether as a factor in the next released FICO model, and then puts it back in for the model after that, we can give you one.  That would be "owing most of the original amount owed on your open installment loans."  It was penalized in FICO 98, not penalized at all in FICO 04, and then penalized again in FICO 8.

Thanks for all your help guys, appreciate it. 

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