@SteveL wrote:
I purchased my FICO scores tonight for Experian and Equifax. The Equifax was 822 and the Experian was way down at 751. The information was identical on both, which is confusing. Experian says I was scored lower because the amount owed on my revolving accounts was too high. My total credit limit on all my cards is around $100,000, but the total owed on them is $726.... yes, $726. I paid all my cards down to $0 as of January 1, 2008, carry no balances and pay off my cards each month (and as you can see, I don't charge a lot). They also said I have too many cards with balances. But if I pay off my cards each month, how is there a balance? Also, at the beginning of February I purchased my TransUnion score via Quarterly Monitoring. It was 789 -- and that was with a reported balance of nearly $9000, which, although paid off January had obviously not been reported yet.
So, my question is... why the huge discrepancy between Experian and Equifax?
Hi, Steve, welcome to the forums! You might want to start by reading Credit Scoring 101, stickied at the top of this board, if you haven't already.
First of all, how they show balances: In almost all cases, the amount reported to the CRA's (credit bureaus) each month is the balance showing on your statements. (HSBC is the exception to this, reporting your balance as of the last business day of the month, I believe.) So those who get their statement and pay promptly, before the due date, will still show balances on their cards. To me, it would make more sense to report the balance the day after the due date, but this is what the lenders and credit bureaus have elected to do, so we're stuck with it.
What this means is that those people who use their cards a lot, and pay when they get their statements, are penalized on their scores. What many of us do is pay before the statement date, thus controlling what it reported. That's the general background info. In your case, this is not really an issue; just an fyi.
On your Experian report, how many total open accounts (not just credit cards) do you have? And how many of them have balances? And what are the same figures for TU and for EQ? The best way to see this is to click "printable report" on each, so that the reported credit limits and balances display for each. Your scores are calculated from what has been reported to the CRA's, not from what shows currently on your accounts, and that's a crucial distinction.
You were OK on your TU report, I think, because you were still under 10% util ($9K / $100K.)
If you can also tell us any of the positive and negative comments from screen 2 on each report (EX only gives negatives), that will help too.
One possibility is that EX is categorizing at least some of your cards differently from the other two, reducing your total credit limit. This can happen if you have Signature Visa cards or World Mastercards. Also, if you have a traditional American Express charge card, and it reports a balance, if it's not coded correctly, it gets clumped in with credit cards, and it can really screw up your util.
* Credit is a wonderful servant, but a terrible master. * Who's the boss --you or your credit?
FICO's: EQ 781 - TU 793 - EX 779 (from PSECU) - Done credit hunting; having fun with credit gardening. - EQ 590 on 5/14/2007
