Oops... all cards reporting $0.00

[masscredit]

I paid a little to much on the one card that reports a balance each month. Used it to pay two bills after I realized that. Those charges took away from the avaialble credit but they didn't post before the statement closed this evening.  How many points should I expect to lose for this little hiccup?

I'm due for a CLI from Cap 1 and want to make some changes to my account. I guess I should get moving on that tomorrow so it's done before my reports update later this week. 

[Anonymous]

Are you meaning that if you dont report balances on your credit report your score will drop? i have never had this problem but my dream is to be debt free. Will that be bad for my fico though?

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Are you meaning that if you dont report balances on your credit report your score will drop? i have never had this problem but my dream is to be debt free. Will that be bad for my fico though?

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Apparently, according to many people on this board, reporting one account with a very low usage is more optimal for your score than reporting all accounts at zero balance. 

Granted, you can still be debt free even by using this strategy.  i.e. have one card report a $10 balance. 

[EddieK]

Based on my experiences, you'd probably lose anywhere from 1-9 points.  

[RobertEG]

Yes, having aleast one card report a balance of less than 10% seems, from anecdotal experiences reported by others, to be optimal for scoring.

However, % util is based only on the current month, so you can always "recover." I dont attempt to fine-tweak each and every month if I dont plan on needing my score for an app that month, so it becomes kinda academic to ensure you fine-tweak each month.

The advanage to such fine-tweaking is to give you your own experimental results.

Try it with and without all cards reporting $0, and see the diffeerence.  Then when you plan to actually app for new credit, you will have a better understanding of how such tweaking will affect your actual profile.

[EW800]

I am likely going to give the "$0 on Everything" plan a shot next month.  I normally just let a few dollars report on one of my cards, but I think I will see what happens if I let the one card report $0 as well.  I am thankful that this is one area of FICO that does not have the memory of an elephant!  

[gamegrrl]

I made the mistake last month of paying off the one card that I use for everything ($30k CL - typical statement balance is about 10% of that) before the statement cut. I got hit with huge score drops across all three CRAs. Huge.

This type of point loss/recovery supposedly readjusts every month. I let the balance ride this month so that it would show up when the statement was cut: November 16th. It will be interesting to see if my scores do, indeed, bounce back this month.

[lt23]

All my cards are reporting $0 this month. Dropped 14 points on EQ and 11 points on TU.

[masscredit]

Results of everything being at $0.00 is... a 13 point loss on my EQ08 score.  I have a Visa that will report a very small balance in a few days so I should get those points back.

[NRB525]

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@masscredit wrote:

Results of everything being at $0.00 is... a 13 point loss on my EQ08 score.  I have a Visa that will report a very small balance in a few days so I should get those points back.

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That was going to be my suggesting, when is your next credit card due and that just takes over this month as the card with a balance. A good reason to stagger the due dates throughout the month (and drive yourself crazy keeping track of them all)