TU 98 vs. TU08

[jello77]

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my-own-fico wrote:

Two questions: 1) perhaps TU 98 compares a card's monthly balance to its high balance and comes up with a high util? 2) how does your EQ FICO compare?

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I pay my cards before the statement date so that only one card reports a balance of less than 1% utilization. So that could not be an issue.

My EQ FICO score is 811, about halfway between the 783 TU-98 and the 822 TU-08 score. So that doesn't tell us much either.

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GregB wrote:

TU FICO 8 will allow a score of 850 while TU 04 and 98 can not go that high. That alone would indicate that people with scores around 800 might score a bit higher in the newest version.

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I think you might be right. The only other explanation I can think of is maybe Walmart uses a credit card enhanced version of FICO 8. Does FICO 8 have this? A card enhanced version may  only be interested in how you handle credit cards, so my lack of any other type of credit (mortgage, auto, etc) may not count against me like it does with TU-98.

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MBOhio2 wrote:

I am a little confused here because I am not familiar with the term "FICO 8" - which models are considered "FICO 8"? Is TU04?

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To add to what GregB said above:

About every 4 to 6 years, FICO introduces a new "edition" of it scoring model. There are currently three editions in common use:

FICO 98 (introduced in 1998-99)

FICO 04 (introduced in 2004-05)

FICO 8 (introduced in 2009)

FICO 8 was originally called FICO 08 because it was supposed to be introduced in 2008, but it was delayed to 2009. Instead of doing the sensible thing and calling it FICO 09, they decided to drop the zero and call it FICO 8.

GregB gave us the official names, but the Transunion versions are commonly called TU-98, TU-04, and TU-08 by people on this board.

Equifax officially calls the 04 version Beacon 5.0 (apparently because they adopted it in 2005), and the 08 version is called Beacon 9.0 (apparently because they adopted it in 2009).

Experian officially calls the 04 version FICO II, and the 08 version is called Experian/FICO Risk Model v08

All these weird names seem like a deliberate attempt to keep us confused.

[MarineVietVet]

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@GregB wrote:

Jello,

TU FICO 8 will allow a score of 850 while TU 04 and 98 can not go that high. That alone would indicate that people with scores around 800 might score a bit higher in the newest version. That difference should be even larger comparing EQ Beacon 9 (FICO 8) to previous versions.

I think you have to consider TU 98 as an odd score with several obsolete characteristics. Differences in HELOCs, large limit CC, signature cards, charge cards, etc. will make comparisons difficult without a huge sample pool.

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This is not correct. All FICO "Classic" scores go from 300-850. This comes from a rather hghly placed individual here at myFICO.

From a BK years ago to:
EX - 3/11 pulled by lender- 835, EQ - 2/11-816, TU - 2/11-782

"Some people spend an entire lifetime wondering if they've made a difference. The Marines don't have that problem".

[MBOhio2]

Thanks for the clarification... my mortgage lender can pull both TU98 and TU04, but does not use the FICO 8, so that's why I was trying to understand if "FICO 8" was just a synonym for another model or if it was a completely different version.

[jello77]

Regarding this comment by GregB:

_____TU FICO 8 will allow a score of 850 while TU 04 and 98 can not go that high.

MarineVietVet wrote:

_____This is not correct. All FICO "Classic" scores go from 300-850. This comes from a rather highly placed individual here at myFICO.

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It may be true that the theoretical maximum score for all Classic FICO scores is 850, but I believe GregB is referring to what the maximum real-world score is for each FICO model.

We had a discussion about maximum scores recently in this thread:

http://ficoforums.myfico.com/t5/Understanding-FICO-Scoring/What-are-the-highest-FICO-scores-ever-rep...

The highest FICO 04 score ever reported by a member of FICO Forums is Experian 844 by "bulbisaur." Below is a link to a message from him that includes an image of the three FICO scores (TransUnion, Equifax, and Experian) that he obtained in 2009 from MyFICO (this was shortly before Experian stopped making FICO scores available):

http://ficoforums.myfico.com/t5/Understanding-FICO-Scoring/Our-Forums-FICO-High-Achievers-Who-has-at...

I have never heard of anyone having a score higher than 844 using the FICO 04 model. I strongly suspect this is the real-world maximum for the FICO 04 model.

The link below is to a 2011 press release describing a study of FICO scores by the company SubscriberWise. Although the FICO model used is not mentioned, I strongly suspect it was the FICO 08 model.

http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20110519006634/en/Statistical-Data-Individuals-Achieving-Highe...

From a sample of 250,000 credit reports, it found that 0.02% had a FICO score of 850. That would amount to about 50 people from the sample.

The company says:

"This is the first large scale and definitive snapshot of national credit bureau data involving what is an extremely rare minority of nationwide consumers that have reached the ultimate and most desired credit score. Our data included every individual who achieved a genuine FICO score of 850."

If you extrapolate the study's finding of a 0.02% rate of credit reports having an 850 score, this would mean that of the 177 million credit card holders in the U.S., over 35,000 would have scores of 850.

I recently had an email exchange with John Ulzheimer, who is a former employee of both FICO and Equifax and now writes a blog about credit issues. He confirmed what GregB has said. His exact quote was:

"The older versions didn't have anyone actually reach 850. The newer version of FICO, dubbed FICO 8, does have some people with 850s."

Here is the reason I suspect the SubscriberWise study linked above used the FICO 8 model:

If it used the FICO 04 model, that would mean there are about 35,000 people in the U.S. with perfect 850 scores using the 04 model. Since this board attracts the world's greatest FICO junkies, surely there would have been someone here who reported one of those perfect 850 scores. But 844 has been the highest ever reported.

This leads me to believe that GregB and John Ulzheimer are correct about the real world maximum score for FICO 04 being something less than 850.

As FICO 08 becomes more common, I think there is a good chance we will see someone here achieve that perfect 850.

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Question for MarineVietVet:

Have you ever heard of anyone with a higher FICO 04 score than 844?  

Is it possible to ask your source here at MyFICO about our theory that the maximum real-world score for FICO 04 is less than 850, but that FICO 8 scores can actually reach that perfect level of 850?

[MarineVietVet]

In an internet article on Yahoo Finance dated October 19, 2010 and written by Jeanine Skowronski a spokesman for myFICO has this to say about the perfect score of 850: ........"tells MainStreet that while most people score in the middle-to-low 700s on their credit scale, less than 1% of the U.S. population (about 1 million people) do, in fact, net a full score of 850".

You quote John Ulzheimer as saying: "The older versions didn't have anyone actually reach 850. The newer version of FICO, dubbed FICO 8, does have some people with 850s."

Now the article doesn't break down the percentages saying which of these 1% have what version of FICO but I think we can safely say that at least part of these folks in October of 2010 had TU98 and TU04. I doubt many lenders were pulling FICO08 back then.

Also in my opinion this goes beyond theories about what is possible in the real world and shows what is actually happening.

This is an interesting discussion and probably one of those back and forths that can never really be decided. I guess we come down to competing quotes. 

From a BK years ago to:
EX - 3/11 pulled by lender- 835, EQ - 2/11-816, TU - 2/11-782

"Some people spend an entire lifetime wondering if they've made a difference. The Marines don't have that problem".

[CS800]

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@GregB wrote:

TU 04 is just an abbreviation referring to a TU FICO based on FICO 04. Mostly used to refer to TU FICO Risk Score Classic 04 as used for a mortgage.

The newer equivalent TU score based on FICO 8 is called TU FICO 8 Risk Score.

The older equivalent TU score based on FICO 98 is called TU FICO Risk Score Classic 98. That is the TU FICO sold here.

The "generations" of FICO are 95, 98, 04, 8. It seems on the newest version, they dropped the appearance of the year from the name since they weren't matching up with the year of release very well anyway.

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Great info Greg, I have been wondering this myself.

[pakman92]

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@jello77 wrote:

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@Anonymous-own-fico wrote:

Two questions: 1) perhaps TU 98 compares a card's monthly balance to its high balance and comes up with a high util? 2) how does your EQ FICO compare?

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I pay my cards before the statement date so that only one card reports a balance of less than 1% utilization. So that could not be an issue.

TU 98 used high balance for utilization calculation for open accounts like American Express.  That could make the difference is you are heavy Amex user.  EQ score does not factor in Amex at all for Util calculation.

[Anonymous]

This whole thread has me wanting to get the Walmart card just to see what my TU 8 FICO is.

I, like Jello only have CC's on my TU report, 1% util, 8yrs AAoA's, oldest account 28.7 yrs old etc......(I have 15 TL's reported on TU, 12 open in perfect standing, 3 closed accounts "closed by consumer and in paid as agrees".

I wonder if my TU 8 would be higher than my TU 98?

Great information in this thread BTW, thanks to all of you who have contributed such excellent information.