topic Re: MyFico Reasons Amusement in Understanding FICO® Scoring

MyFico Reasons Amusement

Dalmus — Wed, 03 May 2017 20:26:57 GMT

Like many of you here, I am mildly addicted to watching my credit score go up as I continue on my journey from BK7.

I now have a couple of nice cards with great limits, and my score has been trending up for the past two years (when I started with MyFico).

As we all know, when you look at your credit scores here, MyFico gives you helpful reasons as to what is holding down your score... Reasons like Missed Payments, Public Records, High DTI, etc etc.

Since I was approved for my AMEX BCE about two months ago, suddenly MyFico tells me that the reason my score is being held down is because I "have a short credit history" and I "have too few credit cards." Both of which are amusing, because my AAoA is 2.5 years, with the oldest account being 10+ years... and I have 20 credit cards (and slowly decreasing.)

I check my actual TU report on CK, and all my accounts are showing like they should.

I think there is a glitch somewhere...

Re: MyFico Reasons Amusement

Anonymous — Wed, 03 May 2017 21:44:05 GMT

Hey Dalmus! Great post. I posted something like this when I got a couple really baffling reason codes. In my case it was:

You've made heavy use of revolving credit

and

You have too many credit accounts with balances.

That's with 1% revolving utilization and 2 cards out of 12 showing a positive balance.

I see in your post you give "High DTI" as an example of a reason code people sometimes get. Strictly speaking that should never happen. DTI is Debt-To-Income ratio and FICO doesn't look at your income. CC Utlization might have been what you had in mind.

In your case, would you mind sharing the complete full text, word for word, of these two reason codes, as they appear on your reports? Often that can shed some light.

Your AAoA is in fact low and it is causing you to penalized by FICO. Even if a penalty is quite small, that can cause a reason code to be triggered. The codes are just a list of any possible way your score might be being hurt.

I am very interested in the code that might be suggesting you have too few credit cards. What is the full text of the reason code? As you observe, 20 credit cards is NOT "too few." No way that you are being penalized for having too few cards. That might happen if a person had one or two cards, or even three. Not 20.

Re: MyFico Reasons Amusement

bettercreditguy1 — Wed, 03 May 2017 22:04:41 GMT

Remember the answers are machine driven. Translated it means you have a new inquiry and a new account reporting. Thus the formula does not know or understand how to evaluate this "new acount" as there is very little or no payment history. Dependent on your file, this will mostly fade after six months so I would not be concerned. Keep making your payments on time and the AAOA will increase as well. Good luck in your journey.

Re: MyFico Reasons Amusement

Anonymous — Wed, 03 May 2017 23:51:24 GMT

Technically, any AAoA of under 7 years and 8 months could produce that reason code as FICO points aren't maximized until that number is reached. We're probably only talking a couple of points though between 5 years and 7 years 8 months, though, so it's quite insignificant IMO. If the OP has an AAoA of 2.5 years, that's scored as 2 years which is relatively young... so I get that reason code being present. I have no clue what is going on with the credit cards reason though, as you have many times more revolvers than is necessary for optimal scoring.

Re: MyFico Reasons Amusement

Dalmus — Thu, 04 May 2017 20:01:26 GMT

So here are the specific factors that MyFico tells me about my Transunion report:

- You havea public record and/or collection on your credit report (True, BK7 discharged in 2011)

- You have a short credit history (According to CK, AAoA is 2.5 years. Oldest reporting account is from 2001, oldest open account is from 2007)

- You have missed payments or derogatory indicators on your credit report (True, but under protest... Utility company mismarked me one month in 2013 as 60 days late, but every time I dispute it comes back verified. In May I was On Time, then in June I was 60 days late, then July I was on time again. CK reports a 100% payment history)

- You have too few credit cards (I actually have 21total on TU, 12 majors and 9 store cards. 14% util until the next round of reporting next week, then I'll be down to 9% all of which is BT balance at 0%)

I know, gotta take CK info with a grain of salt, but for non-scoring information its a great resource.

I'll pull my free yearly 3B from MyFico after NFCU, Discover and Elan report my payoffs and see if that changes anything under Factors Holding my Score Down.

Re: MyFico Reasons Amusement

Anonymous — Thu, 04 May 2017 23:15:07 GMT

Thanks! My comments below in blue.

@Dalmus wrote:
So here are the specific factors that MyFico tells me about my Transunion report:

- You havea public record and/or collection on your credit report (True, BK7 discharged in 2011)

- You have a short credit history (According to CK, AAoA is 2.5 years. Oldest reporting account is from 2001, oldest open account is from 2007)

CK is great for the report itself, but its "summary" software on the front end is completely wrong when it comes to AAoA. It computes your AAoA based on your open accounts only. Both FICO and Vantage include closed accounts in the AAoA calculation.

myFICO makes it really hard to find out your AAoA, but they do provide it. Contributor Joe_Bob explained to me how to see a 3B comparison of my AAoA. He writes:

An easier way is to find your 3B report: enter beta view, pick any score at the top and click "view analysis" then across the top click "compare" then scroll down the "Credit History Length" and there it is for all 3 bureaus.

- You have missed payments or derogatory indicators on your credit report (True, but under protest... Utility company mismarked me one month in 2013 as 60 days late, but every time I dispute it comes back verified. In May I was On Time, then in June I was 60 days late, then July I was on time again. CK reports a 100% payment history)

- You have too few credit cards (I actually have 21total on TU, 12 majors and 9 store cards. 14% util until the next round of reporting next week, then I'll be down to 9% all of which is BT balance at 0%)

Looks like this is the only reason code that makes no sense (given that you have 21 cards). I am not an expert on FICO's reason codes, but I have never heard of this one.

Has anyone else every seen this exact text of a reason code before? (Question for anyone reading this thread.)

I know, gotta take CK info with a grain of salt, but for non-scoring information its a great resource.

OP, can you confirm one more time that you are seeing this reason code ("too few credit cards") inside the myFICO 3B report? (And not Credit Karma?) Is it a reason code associated with your FICO 8 score or some other FICO model?

I'll pull my free yearly 3B from MyFico after NFCU, Discover and Elan report my payoffs and see if that changes anything under Factors Holding my Score Down.

How do you get a free annual 3B from myFICO? I would love to get that if it is free. The last few years I have been signing up for a full "Ultimate" subscription about every 18 months: I get my scores and 3B report, and then I cancel. But I still have to pay for a month.

It looks like the only truly puzzling reason code is the one about you having too few credit cards. That makes no sense, but the others all do.

Re: MyFico Reasons Amusement

Dalmus — Fri, 05 May 2017 03:46:18 GMT

The reasons are straight from MyFico's dashboard when I delve into the TU scores, not from CK.

I should have been more clear about the 3B... I'm on the MF monitoring plan that allows me one 3B per year.

Re: MyFico Reasons Amusement

Revelate — Fri, 05 May 2017 14:29:41 GMT

@Dalmus wrote:
The reasons are straight from MyFico's dashboard when I delve into the TU scores, not from CK.

I should have been more clear about the 3B... I'm on the MF monitoring plan that allows me one 3B per year.

Dashboard, or are we talking actual FICO reason codes (listed with the scores)?

The first are just product idiosyncracies and don't mean much more (if any) than the CK info if I'm being honest about it; reason codes though are reference.

Re: MyFico Reasons Amusement

Dalmus — Fri, 05 May 2017 14:54:00 GMT

@Revelate wrote:
@Dalmus wrote:
The reasons are straight from MyFico's dashboard when I delve into the TU scores, not from CK.

I should have been more clear about the 3B... I'm on the MF monitoring plan that allows me one 3B per year.
Dashboard, or are we talking actual FICO reason codes (listed with the scores)?

The first are just product idiosyncracies and don't mean much more (if any) than the CK info if I'm being honest about it; reason codes though are reference.

Good distinction.

I'm talking about looking at the "plain English" reasons listed with score alerts. For example, on 5/2 I got a score alert that said "Your FICO score has increased from 726 to 732." I click on that alert, and the descriptions I gave above are listed under that update.

I guess I never knew that I could get the actual reason codes from MyFico... Where do I go to see those? Or is that something that's under the new format?

Re: MyFico Reasons Amusement

Revelate — Fri, 05 May 2017 15:05:48 GMT

@Dalmus wrote:
@Revelate wrote:
@Dalmus wrote:
The reasons are straight from MyFico's dashboard when I delve into the TU scores, not from CK.

I should have been more clear about the 3B... I'm on the MF monitoring plan that allows me one 3B per year.
Dashboard, or are we talking actual FICO reason codes (listed with the scores)?

The first are just product idiosyncracies and don't mean much more (if any) than the CK info if I'm being honest about it; reason codes though are reference.
Good distinction.

I'm talking about looking at the "plain English" reasons listed with score alerts. For example, on 5/2 I got a score alert that said "Your FICO score has increased from 726 to 732." I click on that alert, and the descriptions I gave above are listed under that update.

I guess I never knew that I could get the actual reason codes from MyFico... Where do I go to see those? Or is that something that's under the new format?

Actually those are reason codes assuming we're talking Transunion alerts. You have a short credit history is a standard one, not enough credit cards though, that's passing strange if that's where you're seeing them. Would be interested to see a cut and paste of the 4 reason codes personally.

You generally get the reason codes with the full report, but there's some interpretation around them on the FICO 8 side which is a little unfortunate, but the additional scores / score versions will all have full and unmodified reason codes with them.

Re: MyFico Reasons Amusement

Dalmus — Fri, 05 May 2017 15:16:19 GMT

@Revelate wrote:
@Dalmus wrote:
@Revelate wrote:
@Dalmus wrote:
The reasons are straight from MyFico's dashboard when I delve into the TU scores, not from CK.

I should have been more clear about the 3B... I'm on the MF monitoring plan that allows me one 3B per year.
Dashboard, or are we talking actual FICO reason codes (listed with the scores)?

The first are just product idiosyncracies and don't mean much more (if any) than the CK info if I'm being honest about it; reason codes though are reference.
Good distinction.

I'm talking about looking at the "plain English" reasons listed with score alerts. For example, on 5/2 I got a score alert that said "Your FICO score has increased from 726 to 732." I click on that alert, and the descriptions I gave above are listed under that update.

I guess I never knew that I could get the actual reason codes from MyFico... Where do I go to see those? Or is that something that's under the new format?
Actually those are reason codes assuming we're talking Transunion alerts. You have a short credit history is a standard one, not enough credit cards though, that's passing strange if that's where you're seeing them. Would be interested to see a cut and paste of the 4 reason codes personally.

You generally get the reason codes with the full report, but there's some interpretation around them on the FICO 8 side which is a little unfortunate, but the additional scores / score versions will all have full and unmodified reason codes with them.

So this is interesting... The verbal descriptions are different on the MyFico mobile app than they are on the desktop web version:

Web:

Mobile:

Re: MyFico Reasons Amusement

Revelate — Fri, 05 May 2017 16:25:45 GMT

Is that Android? I don't see those on my IOS client.

The mobile version ones look like interpretation and a strange one at that, your web ones look pretty standard though there's some translation differences it should match back to the same numerical reason code.

Re: MyFico Reasons Amusement

Dalmus — Fri, 05 May 2017 17:00:28 GMT

Yeah, that's Android.

It always amazes me when programmers have such glaring differences between different platforms for the same app.

Re: MyFico Reasons Amusement

Anonymous — Fri, 05 May 2017 18:58:23 GMT

Thanks to R for chiming in. I felt certain that the "Too few credit cards" reason code was bogus. Not simply because it was clearly inapplicable in our OP's case, but because I had myself never heard of anyone getting this code.

Revelate, have you ever heard of anyone getting this particular reason? Even a person with (say) two credit cards? There's no question that if a person did only have two cards then it would have a damaging effect on his score -- but I just haven't ever heard of an official reason code being given for it. It always seemed like that that fact was more off-the-record knowledge that the people here had.

Regardless it is clear that this bug in the MF android alerts is harmful to customers. Our OP knew the code had to be in his case BS, because he already had 20 cards. But if somebody had four cards, he could easily assume (based on the reason statement) that he really did not have enough, and therefore start opening more and more cards in an attempt to improve his score.

Re: MyFico Reasons Amusement

Revelate — Fri, 05 May 2017 22:13:35 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
Thanks to R for chiming in. I felt certain that the "Too few credit cards" reason code was bogus. Not simply because it was clearly inapplicable in our OP's case, but because I had myself never heard of anyone getting this code.

Revelate, have you ever heard of anyone getting this particular reason? Even a person with (say) two credit cards? There's no question that if a person did only have two cards then it would have a damaging effect on his score -- but I just haven't ever heard of an official reason code being given for it. It always seemed like that that fact was more off-the-record knowledge that the people here had.

Regardless it is clear that this bug in the MF android alerts is harmful to customers. Our OP knew the code had to be in his case BS, because he already had 20 cards. But if somebody had four cards, he could easily assume (based on the reason statement) that he really did not have enough, and therefore start opening more and more cards in an attempt to improve his score.

I haven't seen reason codes but I know you are dinged heavily on FICO 8 for having no credit cards or more precisely revolvers in FICO 8 (FICO 9 looks like you may really need to have a credit card specifically).

Also there were reports of "too many credit cards" but this was 2-3 years ago and I never saw a copy/paste of reason codes.

I'd report this personally as I think it's a bug, Product Feeback