@Thomas_Thumb wrote:
@elim wrote:due to past CDL's and moving limits, some of us have "high balance" many times greater than our limits. all is well.
ps: (it looks real good to have a big HB on a charge card)
Elim, this may be a bit off topic but thought you might know if there is a short term impact associated with increasing HB on a AMEX charge card 5 fold?
I currently have an AMEX with a $2000 HB and I am thinking of charging $10,000 on the card (car downpayment) and then PIF the charge when it posts on the statement. Would my score take a big hit (current score is 850)? I could just use a check for the downpayment but, I have always wanted to boost my AMEX HB when a good opportunity presented itself.
I can answer that since most large purchase card usage is done with my Amex plat. It has absolutely no impact on TU or EX scores but, oddly, EQ factors in Amex charge cards on FICO 8 (but not FiCO 4) scores and uses "high balance" as a proxy for the CL but it doesn't ding you like a regular CL when your balance=high balance.. Once your high balance exceeds some value between 40k and 60k EQ also ignores Amex card balances. I think this is also true for high CL credit cards. They are dropped from scoring once the CL is high enough.
Another fact about Amex high balance. It's not the highest balance ever. It's only the high balance for the preceding 18 months. Other issuers may vary.
@cashnocredit wrote:
@Thomas_Thumb wrote:
@elim wrote:due to past CDL's and moving limits, some of us have "high balance" many times greater than our limits. all is well.
ps: (it looks real good to have a big HB on a charge card)
Elim, this may be a bit off topic but thought you might know if there is a short term impact associated with increasing HB on a AMEX charge card 5 fold?
I currently have an AMEX with a $2000 HB and I am thinking of charging $10,000 on the card (car downpayment) and then PIF the charge when it posts on the statement. Would my score take a big hit (current score is 850)? I could just use a check for the downpayment but, I have always wanted to boost my AMEX HB when a good opportunity presented itself.
I can answer that since most large purchase card usage is done with my Amex plat. It has absolutely no impact on TU or EX scores but, oddly, EQ factors in Amex charge cards on FICO 8 (but not FiCO 4) scores and uses "high balance" as a proxy for the CL but it doesn't ding you like a regular CL when your balance=high balance.. Once your high balance exceeds some value between 40k and 60k EQ also ignores Amex card balances. I think this is also true for high CL credit cards. They are dropped from scoring once the CL is high enough.
Another fact about Amex high balance. It's not the highest balance ever. It's only the high balance for the preceding 18 months. Other issuers may vary.
How firm is that 18 months? Both of my Amex tradelines are still reporting the historical ones:
1/14 date on the revolver high balance
11/13 date on the charge card high balance, >18 months.
This is on all 3 bureaus currently. Another poster here just yesterday suggested it was 36 months on that for Amex.
@Revelate wrote:
@cashnocredit wrote:
@Thomas_Thumb wrote:
@elim wrote:due to past CDL's and moving limits, some of us have "high balance" many times greater than our limits. all is well.
ps: (it looks real good to have a big HB on a charge card)
Elim, this may be a bit off topic but thought you might know if there is a short term impact associated with increasing HB on a AMEX charge card 5 fold?
I currently have an AMEX with a $2000 HB and I am thinking of charging $10,000 on the card (car downpayment) and then PIF the charge when it posts on the statement. Would my score take a big hit (current score is 850)? I could just use a check for the downpayment but, I have always wanted to boost my AMEX HB when a good opportunity presented itself.
I can answer that since most large purchase card usage is done with my Amex plat. It has absolutely no impact on TU or EX scores but, oddly, EQ factors in Amex charge cards on FICO 8 (but not FiCO 4) scores and uses "high balance" as a proxy for the CL but it doesn't ding you like a regular CL when your balance=high balance.. Once your high balance exceeds some value between 40k and 60k EQ also ignores Amex card balances. I think this is also true for high CL credit cards. They are dropped from scoring once the CL is high enough.
Another fact about Amex high balance. It's not the highest balance ever. It's only the high balance for the preceding 18 months. Other issuers may vary.
How firm is that 18 months? Both of my Amex tradelines are still reporting the historical ones:
1/14 date on the revolver high balance
11/13 date on the charge card high balance, >18 months.
This is on all 3 bureaus currently. Another poster here just yesterday suggested it was 36 months on that for Amex.
I'm pretty sure about the 18 months. But, this is the high balance Amex reports each month, not the historical summary the CRAs also maintain. CRAs seem to have differing historical retention of high balance/cls.
Credit reports combine and track changes in "high balance/CL" for many years. However, the "high balance" field is reported every month when Amex updates the account. That field is the highest balance in the last 18 months on my charge card and is what EQ FICO 8 uses for util. The TU report actually shows what Amex reported each month in the "high balance" field for the last 30 months. EX does not, and just shows the history for what looks like 24 months. You can see here the EX summaries which show the drop in the high balance field. That 58k high balance was incurred 2/12 but EX truncates the summary data at 24 months.
Between Feb 2015 and Apr 2015, your credit limit/high balance was $57,334
Between Dec 2014 and Jan 2015, your credit limit/high balance was $38,096
Between Nov 2014 and Nov 2014, your credit limit/high balance was $21,760
Between Aug 2014 and Oct 2014, your credit limit/high balance was $23,102
Between Jun 2013 and Jul 2014, your credit limit/high balance was $58,392
This is what gave me the opportunity to notice that EQ's FICO 8 score was impacted by utilization when the 38k number hit that was also the actual balance that month and my EQ score dropped like a rock when the HB went to $38,096 then completely recovered when the high balance went up to $57,334. Apparently that was the point that EQ's FICO 8 decided to exclude Amex balances. Ever since then my EQ FICO 8 has not twitched with an Amex balance change.
@cashnocredit wrote:
@Revelate wrote:
@cashnocredit wrote:
@Thomas_Thumb wrote:
@elim wrote:due to past CDL's and moving limits, some of us have "high balance" many times greater than our limits. all is well.
ps: (it looks real good to have a big HB on a charge card)
Elim, this may be a bit off topic but thought you might know if there is a short term impact associated with increasing HB on a AMEX charge card 5 fold?
I currently have an AMEX with a $2000 HB and I am thinking of charging $10,000 on the card (car downpayment) and then PIF the charge when it posts on the statement. Would my score take a big hit (current score is 850)? I could just use a check for the downpayment but, I have always wanted to boost my AMEX HB when a good opportunity presented itself.
I can answer that since most large purchase card usage is done with my Amex plat. It has absolutely no impact on TU or EX scores but, oddly, EQ factors in Amex charge cards on FICO 8 (but not FiCO 4) scores and uses "high balance" as a proxy for the CL but it doesn't ding you like a regular CL when your balance=high balance.. Once your high balance exceeds some value between 40k and 60k EQ also ignores Amex card balances. I think this is also true for high CL credit cards. They are dropped from scoring once the CL is high enough.
Another fact about Amex high balance. It's not the highest balance ever. It's only the high balance for the preceding 18 months. Other issuers may vary.
How firm is that 18 months? Both of my Amex tradelines are still reporting the historical ones:
1/14 date on the revolver high balance
11/13 date on the charge card high balance, >18 months.
This is on all 3 bureaus currently. Another poster here just yesterday suggested it was 36 months on that for Amex.
I'm pretty sure about the 18 months. But, this is the high balance Amex reports each month, not the historical summary the CRAs also maintain. CRAs seem to have differing historical retention of high balance/cls.
Credit reports combine and track changes in "high balance/CL" for many years. However, the "high balance" field is reported every month when Amex updates the account. That field is the highest balance in the last 18 months on my charge card and is what EQ FICO 8 uses for util. The TU report actually shows what Amex reported each month in the "high balance" field for the last 30 months. EX does not, and just shows the history for what looks like 24 months. You can see here the EX summaries which show the drop in the high balance field. That 58k high balance was incurred 2/12 but EX truncates the summary data at 24 months.
Between Feb 2015 and Apr 2015, your credit limit/high balance was $57,334
Between Dec 2014 and Jan 2015, your credit limit/high balance was $38,096
Between Nov 2014 and Nov 2014, your credit limit/high balance was $21,760
Between Aug 2014 and Oct 2014, your credit limit/high balance was $23,102
Between Jun 2013 and Jul 2014, your credit limit/high balance was $58,392
This is what gave me the opportunity to notice that EQ's FICO 8 score was impacted by utilization when the 38k number hit that was also the actual balance that month and my EQ score dropped like a rock when the HB went to $38,096 then completely recovered when the high balance went up to $57,334. Apparently that was the point that EQ's FICO 8 decided to exclude Amex balances. Ever since then my EQ FICO 8 has not twitched with an Amex balance change.
I actually wonder if your spend level does some interesting things with their reporting structure for the very reason it does flirt with the discount line on revolvers.
I'll have to look more closely but what's on the tradeline currently for EX is indeed the 11/13 balance on my still open Zync.
Last full report I got directly from EX was just under the 18 month line, but I have every reason to think that MF is pulling the high balance as reported by the CRA in this case in their parse rather than the historical information:
Between Nov 2013 and Apr 2015, your credit limit/high balance was $11,279
Between May 2013 and Oct 2013, your credit limit/high balance was $2,626
When I next get a full EX report post-mortgage I'll double-check this again. Do you have any historical reports to see what high balance was being reported at a point in time on the main tradeline which I would assume Amex would update directly at the times where EX has shown a change?
The recent TU report I pulled had historical balances as well as high balances reported. Earlier ones did not thoough they did note the dates that that the reported high balance changed.
Since I've had Amex there have only been two times where the high balance that Amex reports monthly changed downward and they were exactly 18 months from when the initlal high balance balance was posted. The historical summaries match the month by month detail.
As for my spending patterns, I'm not sure how unusual or not they are. My median spend is only about 3k but it sometimes spikes. The first month I had my Amex the balance was just over 8k and that remained the high balance for 5 months when it jumped to 22k. Amex seems pretty serious about their NPSL. Almost exactly a year before I did get the Amex I was turned down cold for a pre-screened gold. I expected at some point they would do an FR or at least call but they have proven very reliable. OTOH, I do pay them promptly on their suggested pay date.