topic Re: Experian FICO ? in General Credit Topics

Experian FICO ?

danisgods — Tue, 21 Dec 2010 06:06:32 GMT

Hey guys !

I know that FICO offers Transunion and Equifax, but where can i get the most "FICO" Experian score/report ever,since FICO wont offer it anymore?

What do you recomend?

Re: Experian FICO ?

tsquad131 — Tue, 21 Dec 2010 06:10:53 GMT

joining psecu, its a pennsylvania credit union. I think you donate like $20 and you can join then they can send your experian fico score to you once a month.

Re: Experian FICO ?

danisgods — Tue, 21 Dec 2010 06:12:34 GMT

but then it is one more inquiry in which im not loking for.

Re: Experian FICO ?

laz98 — Tue, 21 Dec 2010 08:08:04 GMT

i guess you could just wait til some of your inquiries fall off then.......i don't think one will hurt you that much, JMO.

Re: Experian FICO ?

llecs — Tue, 21 Dec 2010 12:46:13 GMT

@danisgods wrote:
but then it is one more inquiry in which im not loking for.

Unfortunately, PSECU is the only place you can get your EX FICO score. While you're dinged with an inquiry upon joining, you get monthly EX FICO scores inquiry-free. The only other place to get your EX FICO would be from your lender and that will cost an inquiry with each pull.

Re: Experian FICO ?

haulingthescoreup — Tue, 21 Dec 2010 15:33:52 GMT

@danisgods wrote:
Hey guys !
I know that FICO offers Transunion and Equifax, but where can i get the most "FICO" Experian score/report ever,since FICO wont offer it anymore?
What do you recomend?

FWIW, it wasn't FICO's decision by any means. It was Experian's. They're making lots of money selling their FAKO's from their site.

Re: Experian FICO ?

danisgods — Wed, 22 Dec 2010 06:48:50 GMT

@haulingthescoreup wrote:

@danisgods wrote:
Hey guys !
I know that FICO offers Transunion and Equifax, but where can i get the most "FICO" Experian score/report ever,since FICO wont offer it anymore?
What do you recomend?
FWIW, it wasn't FICO's decision by any means. It was Experian's. They're making lots of money selling their FAKO's from their site.

why would experian's own website sell FAKO score? BTW how to know that one is FAKO and the other is FICO.

Re: Experian FICO ?

Walt_K — Wed, 22 Dec 2010 11:57:10 GMT

"why would experian's own website sell FAKO score?"

Because it's not a fake score. FAKO doesn't mean it's some sort of fraudulent score. FAKO is just a clever play on FICO (it's a fake FICO if you will but not a fake score).

FAKO scores are an alternative scoring model. FICOs, FAKOs, are ostensibly predictive tools that take all of the information in a credit report and reduce it to a single metric that attempts to predict future payment behavior. Fair Isaac's scoring model is FICO. But it's proprietary and they charge for it.

So the credit bureaus decided that rather than paying Fair Isaac, they could develop their own scoring model. Presumably, they hoped their algorithm would take hold and they could compete with Fair Isaac for business both at the lender level and with individual credit seekers. Thus far, it seems that they aren't having as much success with lenders, but they can still sell their scores to consumers through their sites, often bundled up with their credit monitoring services. Here's the rub, because they aren't as successful wtih getting lenders to rely on their model, the value of the scores to consumers is dubious (and their success is probably due in large part to consumer confusion regarding credit scores).

So, EX is selling a FAKO on their site because they are trying to increase their market share in the business of selling credit scores. But you probably don't want to buy their score unless and until they are able to convince lenders that it's a good predictive model to rely on. Even if they could claim it is a more accurate predictor of risk, it doesn't matter if no lender uses it.

Re: Experian FICO ?

BrandonSS — Wed, 22 Dec 2010 18:47:39 GMT

So when a Crediter pulls your Experian score, which do they pull? If they are going directly to Experian, why wouldnt it be the FAKO we see when we pull it directly from EX ourselves?

Re: Experian FICO ?

Walt_K — Wed, 22 Dec 2010 19:06:26 GMT

"If they are going directly to Experian, why wouldnt it be the FAKO we see when we pull it directly from EX ourselves?"

Not sure if you're asking me, and I'm no expert on any of this, so anyone please feel free to correct anything I've said. The creditor is most likely pulling your EX FICO score. I think I've read on here that some lenders use FAKOs whether it be Vantage, Plus, etc., but most likely it is your FICO score. It isn't the FAKO that Experian offers to you because the creditor has much greater bargaining power. If they want the FICO score from EX and EX isn't willing to give it, they can take all of their credit checks to EQ and TU. Naturally, EX allows them to purchase the FICO score.

You and I don't wield that kind of power. EX tells us that we can buy their FAKO or take a hike. It's only one transaction they're losing as opposed to the volume they would lose from each lender if that lender walked away. And while they're losing your business, they're making money from everyone that does purchase their FAKO and they don't have to share that with Fair Isaac. They've basically made a business decision that they can make more money by selling their own score even if they lose customers at the consumer level who are only interested in their FICO scores.

Whether it actually results in increased profits right now, or whether it is a loss-leading strategy hoping that they will eventually cut into Fair Isaac's market share so that they can make money on the lender side as well, I don't know.

Re: Experian FICO ?

haulingthescoreup — Sat, 25 Dec 2010 00:21:52 GMT

When FICO sells us a score, they have to pay Experian (or Equifax or TransUnion.)

If a credit bureau sells a FICO score, they have to pay FICO.

While I certainly don't claim to read the minds of decision-makers at the credit bureaus, I can easily imagine them thinking, Hmmm, most consumers don't know about FICO vs non-FICO scores. We could sell them a FICO score and have to share the proceeds with FICO, or we could sell them a non-FICO credit score and keep the money for ourselves.

It would certainly be a sensible business decision from the bureaus' viewpoint to sell a score from which they kept all the proceeds.

Re: Experian FICO ?

marty56 — Sat, 25 Dec 2010 13:39:14 GMT

@haulingthescoreup wrote:
It would certainly be a sensible business decision from the bureaus' viewpoint to sell a score from which they kept all the proceeds.

I find it odd that TU is the only CRA to offer a non-FICO score as part of thier monitoring service that is actually used. It is unlikely that the EX and EQ would hope that the lenders use their FAKO scores since they know that the lenders are slow to adopt even FICO score model changes. IMHO the FAKO scores offered by EX and EQ provide are just used as bait to get pople to sign up for their service.

LOL how many EX FICO score threads do we need.

Re: Experian FICO ?

haulingthescoreup — Wed, 29 Dec 2010 18:21:44 GMT

@marty56 wrote:

...LOL how many EX FICO score threads do we need.

Hope springs eternal, I guess.

Re: Experian FICO ?

marty56 — Thu, 30 Dec 2010 00:04:03 GMT

@haulingthescoreup wrote:

@marty56 wrote:

...LOL how many EX FICO score threads do we need.
Hope springs eternal, I guess.

LOL I think I have better odds winning the $237 Mega Million lotto. Not that I would complain of course.