topic Re: Jcpenny CC Authorized user question in Understanding FICO® Scoring

Jcpenny CC Authorized user question

Anonymous — Wed, 14 Sep 2016 23:14:15 GMT

Hi!

My mom has had her JCP CC for over 10 years, free of baddies. Today, she added me as an authorized user. Im a little confused though. Will it report to my credit as a new account or will it report her full 10 year history? My AAoA is about 2 years so im hoping it would boost it up.

Thanks!

Re: Jcpenny CC Authorized user question

gdale6 — Tue, 20 Sep 2016 15:47:22 GMT

It will report history starting the month you became AU but you will inherit the age of the account for AAoA purposes

Re: Jcpenny CC Authorized user question

Anonymous — Mon, 31 Oct 2016 16:42:15 GMT

This account still hasnt reported to my credit.... Any help??!

Re: Jcpenny CC Authorized user question

Anonymous — Mon, 31 Oct 2016 21:00:06 GMT

It's only been two weeks. It might well take up to two months for it to begin to appear on your reports.

On the plus side, the AU account will help you with more than AAoA (Average age of accounts). It will also help you with Age of Oldest Account. That's a different factor. How old is your oldest account right now?

Re: Jcpenny CC Authorized user question

Anonymous — Mon, 31 Oct 2016 21:06:18 GMT

It was done sept 10 so it's been a little over a month and a half now. But my oldest account is 3 years.

Thanks for the info!

Re: Jcpenny CC Authorized user question

Anonymous — Mon, 31 Oct 2016 21:24:40 GMT

Whoops, I misread the date. Your initial post mentioned that your mom had added you "today" and that post was on Sept 15. I read that as Oct 15.

You'll get a real nice boost to your Age of Oldest Account when it appears. From 3 to 10. Do you know when your Mom's last statement date was for the JC Penney card?

Re: Jcpenny CC Authorized user question

Anonymous — Mon, 31 Oct 2016 21:39:05 GMT

Looks like we are both mixed up with the dates! Lol Sept 14 is correct. The 2nd statement just cut. It's the 23rd.

Re: Jcpenny CC Authorized user question

Anonymous — Mon, 31 Oct 2016 21:54:23 GMT

A completely reasonable guess is that JCP might have taken a couple weeks to do the housekeeping on its end. (E.g. end of Sept.) Then they might not have reported it till the next time the statement printed. (Oct 23 or perhaps a few days after.) And then it might take another week or two for the CRAs to update their databases.

So giving it another week would be very reasonable, maybe even a bit more. Do you have a tool that enables you to pull your credit reports as often as ince a week? If not, Credit Karma is a good choice and it is free. It will enable you to check once a week to see if the account has appeared yet.

Re: Jcpenny CC Authorized user question

Anonymous — Tue, 08 Nov 2016 20:41:59 GMT

Wow! I totally missed that you replied....whoops lol

I do have CK but nothing yet. Im losing hope!

Re: Jcpenny CC Authorized user question

Anonymous — Tue, 08 Nov 2016 21:26:18 GMT

Well, let's see. Here's an overview of the dates thus far:

Sept 14: You were added as an AU

Sept 23: The JC Penney card billing cycle ended and a statement was generated.

Oct 23: The JC Penney card billing cycle ended and a statement was generated.

Nov 8: You pulled your reports and nothing on them

Did I get those right?

If you pulled the reports on fresh data today (as opposed to waiting passively for an alert) and the card has still not appeared, then you or your mom may want to give JCP a call. Find out if they have reported you an an AU and if so when.

Re: Jcpenny CC Authorized user question

Anonymous — Wed, 09 Nov 2016 14:48:28 GMT

Yep, Pretty spot on with the dates.

I called yesterday and they said It has been reported since Sept 16... Dont think she understood me. She told me to call the credit breau. lol

Re: Jcpenny CC Authorized user question

Anonymous — Wed, 09 Nov 2016 15:15:30 GMT

You might want to call JCP again just to see whether a different customer service rep tells you the same thing. I note that the CSR did tell you to call "the" credit bureau -- it might be worth confirming that JCP has reported it to all three bureaus. I'd also get confirmation of the dates it has so far reported: e.g. it reported on Sept 16, but did they report it again on Sept 23 and Oct 23?

If you hear the same thing, you may want to pick a CRA and do what they suggest. Give the CRA a call and find out why it has not appeared.

You are in an interesting position, which does come up occasionally for people -- which is that your credit report is incomplete rather than incorrect. In other words there isn't false info on it -- there is true info out there that is NOT on it (namely the AU account). The dispute process is really designed for the correction of false info.

I know this from experience since I had an account that was allegedly being reported by the creditor but was not appearing. It wasn't an AU account but in other respects it was similar to your situation.

Here's my advice.

(1) Create a homework sheet that documents key conversations you have had. The first key conversation is with JCP on Nov 8 in which the rep confirmed that the AU account was reported to the credit bureaus on Sept 16.

(2) If you call JCP a second time, document what is confirmed and the date and time of the conversation (as well as the first name of the rep).

(3) If you call a CRA, document which CRA it was, date and time, first name of rep, and what is discussed and especially what if anything is confirmed.

(4) If you call a 2nd or 3rd CRA, again fully document.

And always be pleasant in every conversation with any CSR. Always feel free to call a group a 2nd time if you feel you may have gotten a CSR who may not have understood you or was otherwise not as helpful as another CSR might have been.

This sounds like a lot of work but it's really not. You'll find that this homework sheet will be important as you have further conversations. Basically you are trying to help the creditor and CRA find the disconnect between why an account that is being reported (allegedly) is not appearing in the CRA database. I was successful in my case but it took a while and this kind of documentation was crucial.