How long with no activity to be considered dormant by FICO?

[Anonymous]

Conventional wisdom says buy a cup of coffee every few months to prevent an account from being closed by the creditor due to dormancy but what about FICO.  For example I have an overdraft LOC from a checking account I closed 5 years ago.  Yet it still reports as an open revolving line, last updated about 5 years ago.  I 'wish' it still helped my utilization as far as FICO is concerned  but alas I suspect the line probably does not.  I suspect at some point,,,,, one year, two years of no activity????????? it stopped being included for the purposes of utilization even though it is still reported as an open line.  Does anyone know exactly what the threshold is where FICO considers an open account to be "dormant" specifically for the purposes of utilization.  I have a couple of other revolving lines that are approaching one year of "open with no activity" that I don't want to use, but do not want FICO to stop counting in my UTI just yet.

[haulingthescoreup]

There's a lot of confusion about "dormant" accounts, and I think I'm responsible for a lot of it.   

Here's what gets used in calculating revolving util:

If an account shows as "open" and has updated within the past twelve months, it is included. "Updated" means that it has reported a balance, even of $0. So when I look on my myFICO EQ report and click on my BofA account, the top line says "Status as of Oct, 2010." That means that BofA updated to Equifax in October. (Note: this is different from a "status date" if you have any baddies on your reports. This is a terrible Score Watch version of the term "reporting date", which is what it should say.) But when I click on my Best Buy store card, which I haven't used in a while, it says "Status as of Aug, 2010," because that's the last time I made a payment, and it reported a balance of $0.

It's more likely for store cards to have older "Status as of"/ reporting dates. Regular bank cards tend to update every month, whether you've used them or not. And I have a line of credit from PenFed, opened in May 2009 and never once used, but it shows a "Status as of" date of Sept, 2010. (They're always behind, it seems.) So here's an account that has never had a penny of usage, yet it's faithfully reporting my $0 balance every month. So it's included in calculating util.

If an account shows as "closed", but it still reports a balance AND a CL or highest balance, it is included. This might happen if the lender or the consumer closed an account with a balance still due, and the lender kept reporting either the CL or the highest balance.

"Dormant" is a term that I think we invented for Score Watch alerts saying that there has recently been activity on an inactive account. We all thought that we were getting dinged for this (and I posted about this a lot!), but in fact, it was just a credit alert, a heads-up that hey, someone might have found an old card of yours and is using it. The only way that there's a score change for using a "dormant"/ inactive account is if it hadn't reported in over a year, was being ignored for util, and now it's being considered in util calcs again. It doesn't help that Score Watch alerts have those ridiculous messages saying "Your score might have changed because..." These messages are completely meaningless. I still get these saying that my score might have changed because of a late payment, and I completely freak out because I just don't do lates any more.

So in your particular case, check your reports and confirm that it says "open." Look for the most recent reporting date (called "Status as of" on myFICO reports), and if that date is within the last 12 months, it's being used. If the date is older, and you use it, all that will happen is that it's back being included in your util, both the CL and any balance that it might report.

[Anonymous]

Thank you very much.  That is exactly the type of answer I was looking for.  So by those rules my old overdraft line of credit which shows as open but hasn't reported in over 4 years is not helping my UTI.  I figured as much.  I don't think I can generate any new activity.  I never closed it and the bank never closed it but I no longer have practical access.  I do have a couple of other unused accounts approaching a year.  I guess I'll try to generate some  token activity.  I wonder if I just mailed in a $2 payment on a zero balance creating a positive balance.  They would have to send me a statement and likely report when they did.