Is it better to have 0 balance reported or <10% balance reported each month

[masscredit]

I have the closing dates on my cards spaced out so I can alternate useage. There is no balance transfer fee on my Cap 1 cards so I use them to pay off the other cards and then pay those cards off before their due dates. I just let Barclays report right now because it's an Apple card with promotional 0% purchases from there.  This gives all of my cards use if I want to, gives a few cards bigger use each month and most get paid in full while leaving one reporting a balance. I keep everything planned out each month for use, closing dates and payments. 

[A_Noob]

It was my Equifax score and it is 1 of 2 revolving accounts.

[noobafterbk]

Yes i paid off my credit card balance and score actually dropped 21points!! How can this system be valid when paying off your debt penalizes you???

[Revelate]

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@noobafterbk wrote:
Yes i paid off my credit card balance and score actually dropped 21points!! How can this system be valid when paying off your debt penalizes you???

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Because statistical models of massive amounts of consumer data suggests that the incidence rate of default is higher with someone who has 0's accross the board for their revolving tradeline balances.

Why it is this way I don't know, other than the historical belief that 0 indicates non-use... which is not the case on all of the bureaus data sets today but it's possible FICO simply hasn't caught up with the data collection advances that the bureaus have made in the last half decade... maybe the new FICO 13 (or 14, whatever they wind up calling it) will take that newly (within the last 2 years) reported data into consideration and not penalize people for that.