topic Re: Fico8 Score drops 37 points w/no debt, no late payments, no enquiries and no change in available in Understanding FICO® Scoring

Fico8 Score drops 37 points w/no debt, no late payments, no enquiries and no change in available cre

mjposner — Fri, 30 Jan 2026 02:37:40 GMT

My score went from 835 to 798 in one month on FICO8 per Creditwise.

I use one credit card and pay every month. I had a car loan which I paid off last spring. No debt.

Payment history is exceptional; amount of debt is very good???, length is exceptional; amount of new credit is very good; and credit mix is exceptional.

My available credit did not change

VantageScore® 3.0 says 831

Experian says my Fico8 Score is 803 but that it dropped 22 points.

Re: Fico8 Score drops 37 points w/no debt, no late payments, no enquiries and no change in available

BrutalBodyShots — Fri, 30 Jan 2026 02:40:02 GMT

What exactly changed between your "before" credit reports and "after" credit reports?

Credit scores are drawn upon credit report data only. Looking to the data is where the answer will be found.

Re: Fico8 Score drops 37 points w/no debt, no late payments, no enquiries and no change in available

Patient957 — Fri, 30 Jan 2026 03:58:45 GMT

@mjposner wrote:
I use one credit card and pay every month... No debt.

All zeros penalty, perhaps?

Did you let that one credit card report a zero balance?

Re: Fico8 Score drops 37 points w/no debt, no late payments, no enquiries and no change in available

Thomas_Thumb — Fri, 30 Jan 2026 04:28:57 GMT

No detailed data provided to evaluate possible causes. As mentioned above, scoring is based on data pulled from CRA reports.

Did the single card report a high balance resulting in an elevated card utilization, say +70%? Since your mix is excellent, I suspect you have 7 or more cards. If you have 3 or less open cards, a high single card utilization usually results in a high aggregate utilization as well.

Did a new CC account show up on your file along with an inquiry? Amount of new credit being rated very good suggests an account was opened in the most recent 12 months.

A detailed before/after comparison of all accounts might help pinpoint cause(s).

Re: Fico8 Score drops 37 points w/no debt, no late payments, no enquiries and no change in available

mjposner — Fri, 30 Jan 2026 12:55:38 GMT

No new credit cards, last hard inquiry was 14 months ago.

I use my one credit card for everything, its has a 35k credit limit, I charge roughly 3-5k monthly and timely pay it off in full every month.

Total Credit across 4 cards that I have had for many years is 170k, hasn't changed.

I sold my home in 2 years ago and now rent, and I have no car payment either.

Did the single card report a high balance resulting in an elevated card utilization, say +70% (Max utilization is less than 20% in anyone month)

Did a new CC account show up on your file along with an inquiry? No

I suspect you have 7 or more cards. No, I have 4 open cards, haven't closed any either

Re: Fico8 Score drops 37 points w/no debt, no late payments, no enquiries and no change in available

1lifeisworthit — Fri, 30 Jan 2026 16:56:17 GMT

Hello, OP.

Whatever it is that caused the drop is going to be found in the difference in your reports. In the US you can only read them at annualcreditreport.com

Something was different on your reports from the last time they were pulled by Fair Isaac Corporation, to this time.

A long-ago closed account that was boosting you may have aged off. Utilization may have crossed a threshold. An account that is not yours may have appeared on your reports. I'm sorry but we just don't know what happened, not having been reading your reports.

I'd say, go read your official reports and make certain you aren't carrying someone else's load by accident. It's free. And if that isn't the case, I'd dig deeper. Because the reports are where the answer is.

Edited because I used the wrong word.

Re: Fico8 Score drops 37 points w/no debt, no late payments, no enquiries and no change in available

BrutalBodyShots — Fri, 30 Jan 2026 17:51:38 GMT

@mjposner, you didn't answer the first first question I asked in my reply to you. What changed?

You listed out a lot of things that didn't change and such, but you haven't actually answered the question as to what was different between your "before" and "after" credit report data. Credit scores are only drawn upon credit report data, so when a 37 point change occurs by definition something with the input data (your credit reports) changed.

Re: Fico8 Score drops 37 points w/no debt, no late payments, no enquiries and no change in available

RobertS2 — Sat, 31 Jan 2026 03:18:04 GMT

There's no score-change explanation? The place I check has that feature.

Is there anything new on your credit report?

Re: Fico8 Score drops 37 points w/no debt, no late payments, no enquiries and no change in available

Thomas_Thumb — Sat, 31 Jan 2026 03:39:03 GMT

@mjposner

As a further follow-up, providers of Fico scores typically furnish 2-4 reason codes that describe negatives in your file that are impacting your score. They are listed in rank order of impact. I would expect a 22 or 37 point drop on a +800 score to push the cause of the score drop to top billing.

Check before and after reason codes, if available, and post the lists.

Re: Fico8 Score drops 37 points w/no debt, no late payments, no enquiries and no change in available

mjposner — Sat, 31 Jan 2026 16:44:39 GMT

Experian shjows a drop from 825 on 1/21 to 803 on 1/29 using Fico8.

Comparing reports from Jan 21 and Jan 31

Under see what changed I got one thing: Your balance decreased $80 since your previous report, not including derogatory or collection accounts. You may or may not see a score change, since this balance is associated with other factors that affect your score.

Equifax uses Vantage and shows an 832

Equifax says "What's hurting You have no negative factors impacting your Score."

I went through all 3 credit reports. Almost identical, zero balances on 5 credit cards (one has 6 cards, I used to be on my ex-wife's Amex, I was removed years ago and that has a $0 balance). Last hard inquiry was 10/24. Nothing else.

So all I can tell is paying off the one credit card I use made my score drop.

Re: Fico8 Score drops 37 points w/no debt, no late payments, no enquiries and no change in available

MrFiah — Sat, 31 Jan 2026 21:54:29 GMT

@mjposner wrote:
Experian shjows a drop from 825 on 1/21 to 803 on 1/29 using Fico8.
Comparing reports from Jan 21 and Jan 31
Under see what changed I got one thing: Your balance decreased $80 since your previous report, not including derogatory or collection accounts. You may or may not see a score change, since this balance is associated with other factors that affect your score.
Equifax uses Vantage and shows an 832
Equifax says "What's hurting You have no negative factors impacting your Score."
I went through all 3 credit reports. Almost identical, zero balances on 5 credit cards (one has 6 cards, I used to be on my ex-wife's Amex, I was removed years ago and that has a $0 balance). Last hard inquiry was 10/24. Nothing else.
So all I can tell is paying off the one credit card I use made my score drop.

Yes, that is known as the all zero penalty. Let a card report a balance and your score will return to what it previously was.

Re: Fico8 Score drops 37 points w/no debt, no late payments, no enquiries and no change in available

Patient957 — Sat, 31 Jan 2026 22:20:46 GMT

@mjposner wrote:
So all I can tell is paying off the one credit card I use made my score drop.

The all zeros penalty, which is exactly what I said in post #3 above, but you didn't respond or answer my question. The question was:

"Did you let that one credit card report a zero balance?"

Re: Fico8 Score drops 37 points w/no debt, no late payments, no enquiries and no change in available

mjposner — Sun, 01 Feb 2026 15:18:10 GMT

Sorry, I thought it was clear when i stated I paid the one card I use in full every month.

So my choice is a higher credit score and pay interest oin a credit card or a lower score and owe nothing?

Does anyone know what the minimum balance needed to maintain a higher score? $10? $100 or more?

Re: Fico8 Score drops 37 points w/no debt, no late payments, no enquiries and no change in available

Patient957 — Sun, 01 Feb 2026 16:46:39 GMT

@mjposner wrote:
Sorry, I thought it was clear when i stated I paid the one card I use in full every month.
So my choice is a higher credit score and pay interest oin a credit card or a lower score and owe nothing?
Does anyone know what the minimum balance needed to maintain a higher score? $10? $100 or more?

You don't need to pay interest - if you pay the statement balance in full each month, you take advantage of the grace period and never pay interest. However, if you don't want to pay interest, you do need to use the card each month, so even after you pay your statement balance, some non-zero blanace remains.

I'm not sure the minimum but $5 to $10 should be enough.

Also, usually when we think of paying a card in full each month, we're talking about the statement balance, not necesarily about paying the balance down to zero. If you're not sure the difference between paying the statment balance and paying the current balance, these are concepts that every credit card user should understand.

The terms you need to understand are:

-Statement Balance

-Current Balance

-Reported Balance

-Grace Period

Re: Fico8 Score drops 37 points w/no debt, no late payments, no enquiries and no change in available

FicoMike0 — Sun, 01 Feb 2026 16:41:06 GMT

Utilization is about reported balance, not carrying a balance. The zero penalty occurs when all of your cards report zero. For a card that you're using, that occurs if you pay to zero before it posts.

To be more clear, you have four open cards, but only use one?

Do the three unused cards all report zero balance?

37 points seems like a lot for all zero. If look at annualcreditreport.com and check for something else.

Re: Fico8 Score drops 37 points w/no debt, no late payments, no enquiries and no change in available

Thomas_Thumb — Sun, 01 Feb 2026 23:40:03 GMT

@mjposner

To avoid an "all zeros" penalty a single revolving CC need to report a small balance each month - minimum is $5 to avoid not reporting. No need to carry a balance. Always pay in full before due date.

The actual Fico penalty is for "no recent revolving activity". Amex charge cards are not revolving accounts so they don't count toward activity. Some posters have said their closed loop store cards are not considered in activity even though they are revolvers. It depends on how the card issuer codes them.

You should not see any point penalty for utilization associated with a single card if it reports under 9% and aggregate UT shows less than 5%. No need to report a minuscule balance unless your card has a minuscule CL. I think it is best to allow balances to report naturally.

P.S.

Do you mind listing the number of open and closed accounts by type?

Some other threads on the forum discussed minimum requirements for an exceptional mix rating on Fico reports. The data from posters suggested a minimum of 7 credit card accounts but not all needed to be open. Others felt mix might zero in on a minimum number of "bankcard" type of accounts. Another viewpoint is a minimum total accounts is important in addition to a minimum bankcard accounts.

Your prior posts mention 4 open cards but not sure if there are any closed ones on file. Quantity of other account types is important for compatative analysis.

Re: Fico8 Score drops 37 points w/no debt, no late payments, no enquiries and no change in available

Negative_Alpha — Thu, 05 Feb 2026 23:56:32 GMT

"You should not see any point penalty for utilization associated with a single card if it reports under 9% and aggregate UT shows less than 5%."

That's interesting to hear - my experience has been that going from 2% aggregate utilization to 1% improves the FICO 8 by seven points. Also, I had a situation where my aggregate utilization was about 0.4% and Experian rounded it to zero and gave a ten point penalty.

Re: Fico8 Score drops 37 points w/no debt, no late payments, no enquiries and no change in available

Thomas_Thumb — Fri, 06 Feb 2026 01:28:06 GMT

Fico does not look at revolving account activity based on aggregate utilization. It looks at revolving accounts individually. Experian rounding aggregate UT to zero in the front end summary is not what Fico uses for evaluating revolving account activity.

Did you look at your negative reason codes? Did you see one that says "no recent revolving account activity"?

Are your reported scores Fico 8? The only credit score version I know of that may differentiate between 1% and 2 % aggregate utilization is VantageScore 3.0 and even that model will not shift score 7 points. Look for other changes in your profile as the root cause such as number of accounts reporting balances or highest individual card utilization.

Re: Fico8 Score drops 37 points w/no debt, no late payments, no enquiries and no change in available

mjposner — Sun, 08 Feb 2026 15:43:11 GMT

To be clear I pay the full balance on the one card I use every month, usually between 2-5k. The other open cards are all at a Zero Balance, though I did use one card and charged $2500 (they had a point special and I got a $135 gift card ). I paid that off in full when due. Interestingkly I got a new Fico 8 score (Updated on February 8, 2026) from Credit Wise showing an 835. 4 categories showed exceptional and one Amount of New Credit said Very Good. Vantage score shows 830 as of 2/3/26. I have a balance of about $1500 now on the one carde I use.

Equifax:

Open accounts 5
Accounts ever late 0
Closed accounts 0
Collections 0
Overall credit usage
Credit used: $0
Credit limit: over 100k
Debt summary Credit card and credit line debt $0
Loan debt $0
Collections debt $0
Total debt $0
Averageaccount age 11 yrs 4 mos
Oldest account 38 yrs 7 mos

Transunion:

Open accounts 5
Accounts ever late 0
Closed accounts 0
Collections 0
Overall credit usage

Credit used: $0
Credit limit: over 100k
Debt summary Credit card and credit line debt $0
Loan debt $0
Collections debt $0
Total debt $0
Averageaccount age 12 yrs 4 mos
Oldest account 40 yrs 1 mo

Re: Fico8 Score drops 37 points w/no debt, no late payments, no enquiries and no change in available

Thomas_Thumb — Sun, 08 Feb 2026 21:00:29 GMT

FWIW -

A few posters have reported score drops when an inactive, dormant, card 1st reports a balance. That penalty disappeared the following statement. Further use of the card did not cause a score drop.

Most CC issuers continue to report on cards in months where they are not used. However, some stop reporting after an extended period of non use resulting in a blank or NR in the status field. Over time such an account can get classified as dormant.

A search on dormant accounts should bring up threads where forum members discuss their experiences.