topic Re: Comment added to CBR= huge score drop. in General Credit Topics

Comment added to CBR= huge score drop.

Anonymous — Thu, 02 Aug 2018 09:54:46 GMT

Good morning!

Well not so much for me. I got an alert that an account of mine added a comment stating “ account information disputed biy consumer, meets FCRA requirements.” It also causes my fako score to drop over 100 points need to find FICO score,

I had no idea comments had an effect let alone a huge effect on score. This situation is different because I actually didn’t dispute anything. The account has 100% perfect payment history for all 7 years open. Less than 9% util. Does anybody know if these comments can be removed And if FICO scores actually use the comment field as a score able field? Thanks!!

Re: Comment added to CBR= huge score drop.

rbentley — Thu, 02 Aug 2018 11:18:57 GMT

I feel your pain. My scores dropped 8 points when that notation appreared on my Cap1 account. I posted about this in the "Saturation technique" thread and was told that such a notation could not cause a point drop, but there was absolutely no other change or explanation for the drop. I am shocked you could have such a tremendous drop. That sounds extreme and you should explore all other possible explanationss. Obtaining your full reports seems very prudent. You might want to contact the creditor directly and see if they can explain the notation and remove it. Failing that (and that did not work for me), you might want to contact each of the CRB's and see if you can get them to remove the notation. Someone reported successs with that approach. https://ficoforums.myfico.com/t5/Rebuilding-Your-Credit/The-Saturation-Technique-Best-GW-adjustment-odds/m-p/5314605#M566488 Please report back on what you do and your results.

Re: Comment added to CBR= huge score drop.

Anonymous — Thu, 02 Aug 2018 11:18:46 GMT

Thanks for the reply. I agree 100 points is drastic but it’s also the fako score so who really knows. It May have no impact on actual Fico. My wife and I are joint account holders, her score (fako) only dropped 9 points. Pulled my full credit report and nothing changes at all. So this appears to be it. Will call and if that doesn’t work will do a cfpb andnor credit bureau dispute. Score impact or not, it’s not accurate.

Re: Comment added to CBR= huge score drop.

pipeguy — Thu, 02 Aug 2018 15:49:16 GMT

wrote:
Thanks for the reply. I agree 100 points is drastic but it’s also the fako score so who really knows. It May have no impact on actual Fico. My wife and I are joint account holders, her score (fako) only dropped 9 points. Pulled my full credit report and nothing changes at all. So this appears to be it. Will call and if that doesn’t work will do a cfpb andnor credit bureau dispute. Score impact or not, it’s not accurate.

Without being snarky, and what do you hope to achieve by filing a frivolous cfpb or CRA's "dispute"?

To force you vantage score to restore your score to what it was before the comment (?) - even though that score (VS based) is rarely used even by those that offer "free scores" online such as Cap-1 and their VS based "Credit Wise" - yet hard pull EQ/TU/EX and report FICO scores for actual credit inquiries - there are many other examples of lenders offering Vantage Scores for free, but not using VS for actual credit decisions.

You also memtioned that you just pulled your complete report and there was nothing showing on that report - so again, what could a complaint (comment aka they do not deal directly with consumer cases) to the cfpb do to help you? In a damned, if you do, and damned if you don't way if you file a dispute with the credit agencies (TU/EQ/EX) disputing the disputed comment by saying you disputed an account which in fact you are now disputing ever making such comment - then the account(s) will record - what you are trying to avoid, you have filed a new dispute.

I know it's annoying to watch the Fico vs Vantage Score balancing act, but one needs to pick their battles and IMO to file a cfpb "comment" aka complaint disputing your VS score seems like a waste of time.

BTW, my vantage scores are in the low 600's (Fair) yet my FICO scores are in the mid 700's (VG) - I have 24 active cards and over $400k in revolving credit lines which will give you some idea how "useful" Vantage Score are in practical usage.

Re: Comment added to CBR= huge score drop.

Anonymous — Thu, 02 Aug 2018 20:07:43 GMT

@rbentleyI posted about this in the "Saturation technique" thread and was told that such a notation could not cause a point drop, but there was absolutely no other change or explanation for the drop.

I was the one that told you that in the Saturation Techique thread and I'll tell the same thing to the OP here. A comment cannot cause a score drop. A comment can only cause an account to not be considered by the FICO algorithm. An account under "dispute" may be eliminated from the FICO equation all together until the dispute is over and the dispute language is removed from the account. It's important then to understand that it's the account not being considered that may impact a score, not a comment on the account. An account comment is no different than any other written piece of information on an account such as your address.

I'd suggest the OP look at his FICO scores. FAKO drops of 100 points are just for laughs and don't matter.

I've had a ton of my accounts at one point or another possess dispute language and my FICO scores never budged even 1 point during those times. I therefore assume that at least in my case any accounts with dispute language were still being considered the same way [normal] by the FICO algorithm.

Re: Comment added to CBR= huge score drop.

Anonymous — Thu, 02 Aug 2018 23:58:35 GMT

I really appreciate everyone’s feedback. I didn’t mean to get people upset. I’ve acknowledged multiple times I know fako doesn’t matter just was a little alarming.

I called synchrony earlier and they confirmed they would put a request in to remove the dispute language. Alls well that ends well.

Re: Comment added to CBR= huge score drop.

Anonymous — Fri, 03 Aug 2018 07:41:00 GMT

Ah so this was a Synchrony account. This further solidifies my point that the comment had no bearing on your score, as Synchrony was one of my lenders that constantly put dispute comments on my accounts with them during my GW campaign. Every Round of letters I sent out resulted in a GW adjustment denial and a letter stating that they've added "a dispute comment" to the account. I would then have to write them referencing my previous letter that was in no way disputing any information and that I was in fact acknowledging that the reported information was indeed accurate. They'd then drop the dispute comment, only to add it back again after receiving my next Round of GW letters. At no time though did my score ever change at all whether the dispute comments were there or absent.

Re: Comment added to CBR= huge score drop.

AndySoCal — Fri, 03 Aug 2018 11:40:51 GMT

An account in dispute can affect the score becasue the trade line(s) that are in dispute are not fully factored into the score. I agree that it should not cause that big of a drop. Something else has changed that will cause the drop that is derogatory.

Re: Comment added to CBR= huge score drop.

Anonymous — Mon, 06 Aug 2018 09:44:35 GMT

Just a final update. Got an alert the comment that synchrony put on my tradeline was removed and my fako score shot up. To solidify what others said, this shows me how garbage fako score is. Pulled my Fico score for TU and it was actually higher than when I previously checked. I guess it was just the shock of seeing a drop like that, at least it wasn’t some random collection out of nowhere. thanks for all the feedback.

Re: Comment added to CBR= huge score drop.

Anonymous — Tue, 07 Aug 2018 03:42:00 GMT

Ironic data point for me to add here. For some reason my Synchrony account (Lowe's) didn't report to all 3 bureaus this month, or the bureaus didn't all update on or about the 27th like they usually do. I spoke with Synchrony chat on the 2nd and asked if they could do a re-reporting, or look into their reporting. Obviously I was in no way "disputing" anything. On the 4th I noticed dispute comments were added to my account once they did in fact report. No score drops though, verifying here that a comment will not drop your scores. I hit up chat again and asked them to remove the dispute language, something they said they would immediately do and send me a verification letter for. I must say that Synchrony is pretty annoying when it come to adding such comments to accounts.

Re: Comment added to CBR= huge score drop.

Anonymous — Tue, 07 Aug 2018 04:32:49 GMT

With so many plaintiffs attorneys out there. Hey are probably overly sensitive to FCRA and putting disputes on the file. Since as you mention a dispute comment doesn’t get a score, it’s easier to take off then after you e been sued. Well still easy after sued just potentially costly.

Re: Comment added to CBR= huge score drop.

Anonymous — Tue, 07 Aug 2018 23:11:13 GMT

I disputed something on my experian and got a comment on equifax report for some odd reason. Said it was being disputed and did not affect my score.

Re: Comment added to CBR= huge score drop.

Anonymous — Wed, 08 Aug 2018 00:10:27 GMT

@AnonymousI disputed something on my experian and got a comment on equifax report for some odd reason. Said it was being disputed and did not affect my score.

Correct, because comments have no bearing on score.

It's imperative that everyone understand that comments have no impact on scores. Those that are under the impression that they do simply need to understand the simple fact that alerts and score changes do not need to be related and in this example they definitely aren't ever related.

Re: Comment added to CBR= huge score drop.

Anonymous — Wed, 08 Aug 2018 21:55:23 GMT

@Anonymous

It's imperative that everyone understand that comments have no impact on scores.

While formally correct, I find this statement to be misleading. As far as I know (and please correct me if I'm wrong) a comment like "account information disputed by consumer" can cause the account in question to be excluded from fico scoring. While the comment itself does not change the fico score, the exclusion of the account can effect the fico score. Indeed, depending on the account and the rest of the credit report, the fico score can go up, go down down or stay the same.

Suppose for example your credit report only has minor baddies and your oldest account is much older than your other accounts. If an "account under dispute" comment is added to your oldest account (and nothing else changes on your report) your AoOA will drop and mostly likely your fico score will go down.

But if the "account under dispute" comment is added to an account which does not stand out from the other accounts, the fico score will stay the same (or only changes a little bit in either direction).

Re: Comment added to CBR= huge score drop.

Anonymous — Wed, 08 Aug 2018 05:35:12 GMT

Correct, but the bottom line is that comments (words) on your credit report don't impact scores.

It's also important to understand that an account under dispute is not the same thing as a comment stating that the ''consumer disputes account information." Such a comment can exist when an account is never actually disputed. I've had at least 3 different accounts suddenly show language in the comment section that "consumer disputes account information..." (one just 5 days ago) and never once have my scores been impacted, meaning that none of the accounts were actually ever disputed/not considered by the FICO algorithm.

Re: Comment added to CBR= huge score drop.

Anonymous — Wed, 08 Aug 2018 21:56:04 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:

It's also important to understand that an account under dispute is not the same thing as a comment stating that the ''consumer disputes account information." Such a comment can exist when an account is never actually disputed.

Yes, but from what I have been reading, it seems that it is the comment "consumer disputes account information" which actually causes the account to be (at least partially) excluded from fico scoring. So even if the account is not actually disputed, the fico score could change. But I'm not an expert and all my knowledge comes from myfico.com and other website, and I never know what information I can trust. So I certainly could be wrong about this.

@Anonymous wrote:

I've had at least 3 different accounts suddenly show language in the comment section that "consumer disputes account information..." (one just 5 days ago) and never once have my scores been impacted, meaning that none of the accounts were actually ever disputed/not considered by the FICO algorithm.

This is strong evidence that you are right. But if you look at your credit report say from 5 days ago, would you expect the fico score to be different if the account with the comment were excluded? Would any of the scoring parmeters (AoOA, AAoA, Utilization, baddies,....) cross any boundaries?

Re: Comment added to CBR= huge score drop.

Anonymous — Wed, 08 Aug 2018 15:11:15 GMT

@Anonymous
This is strong evidence that you are right. But if you look at your credit report say from 5 days ago, would you expect the fico score to be different if the account with the comment were excluded? Would any of the scoring parmeters (AoOA, AAoA, Utilization, badies,....) cross any boundaries?

In my example from 5 days ago, likely not. I did however have this language appear and then be removed a good half-dozen times on two different dirty accounts during my rebuild. In those cases, if my only dirty account was being "ignored" by the FICO algorithm due to a simple comment of "consumer disputes account information" I would have seen my scores jump up 70-80 points during the dispute, as that's the gain I saw once the negative information was actually removed from those accounts and my report was clean.

Re: Comment added to CBR= huge score drop.

Anonymous — Wed, 08 Aug 2018 17:19:46 GMT

@AnonymousIn my example from 5 days ago, likely not. I did however have this language appear and then be removed a good half-dozen times on two different dirty accounts during my rebuild. In those cases, if my only dirty account was being "ignored" by the FICO algorithm due to a simple comment of "consumer disputes account information" I would have seen my scores jump up 70-80 points during the dispute, as that's the gain I saw once the negative information was actually removed from those accounts and my report was clean.

Ok. That does prove that I was wrong. But now I have a couple of questions. Suppose an account is actually disputed.

1. Will the account be ignored by the Fico algorithm during the dispute ? Sometimes? All the time?

2. Where on the credit report will it be indicated that an account is actually under dispute ?

Re: Comment added to CBR= huge score drop.

Anonymous — Wed, 08 Aug 2018 18:24:15 GMT

Those are great questions, but ones that will need to be answered by someone other than myself. I've never disputed an account, so I know next to nothing when it comes to the ins and outs of disputes. All I have ever seen with my reports are dispute "comments" on accounts and can simply verify that such comments don't impact the FICO algorithm at all. I would be curious to hear from those that have done actual disputes, though.