topic Re: Score Incongruencies in General Credit Topics

Score Incongruencies

lizmariposa — Tue, 09 Feb 2021 01:14:05 GMT

So, my Equifax FICO 8 according to myFICO is 688 as of 02/07. My total credit card balances increased $25 this month, so I am using only 2% of my credit. I guess this went up from 1%. myFICO says this has not decreased my Equifax score. BUT, I added a seven day trial today with Experian, and they claim that my Equifax FICO 8 is 676. I really don't know what to think, but it's frustrating either way. Not being able to trust the accuracy of numbers claimed on the same model and model type, or being lowered 12 frigging points over $25 when NO ONE else has lowered my score. Also... some bureaus giving you a good healthy amount of points for progress, 5 or 6, and Experian being like "oh, hey, here's 1 point for your efforts." Grrrr!!

I really don't know what's up with the Experian and myFICO difference though. And it's bugging me as it ought to be the same. I'll have to wait till 02/10 when my credit reports officially drop on myFICO and we'll see if more credit score numbers change.

Re: Score Incongruencies

chiefone4u — Tue, 09 Feb 2021 01:18:34 GMT

@lizmariposa wrote:
So, my Equifax FICO 8 according to myFICO is 688 as of 02/07. My total credit card balances increased $25 this month, so I am using only 2% of my credit. I guess this went up from 1%. myFICO says this has not decreased my Equifax score. BUT, I added a seven day trial today with Experian, and they claim that my Equifax FICO 8 is 676. I really don't know what to think, but it's frustrating either way. Not being able to trust the accuracy of numbers claimed on the same model and model type, or being lowered 12 frigging points over $25 when NO ONE else has lowered my score. Also... some bureaus giving you a good healthy amount of points for progress, 5 or 6, and Experian being like "oh, hey, here's 1 point for your efforts." Grrrr!!

I really don't know what's up with the Experian and myFICO difference though. And it's bugging me as it ought to be the same. I'll have to wait till 02/10 when my credit reports officially drop on myFICO and we'll see if more credit score numbers change.

If both scores where generated at the same time, they would be the same... however hour's or day's between the score generated could allow changes to report thus providing two different scores for the same CRA.

Re: Score Incongruencies

Anonymous — Tue, 09 Feb 2021 01:42:22 GMT

One can easily have a 20 point score variance between scores from the same model but different bureaus, even with similar or identical data. Don't take anything personal and it isn't the "bureau" not giving you points... it's all based on a scoring algorithm and the data fed into it. You have no gripe with EX or any other bureau itself and there is nothing to not trust. Understand that all scores are accurate.

As for why your score may be different, know that there are only 3 criteria that go into a Fico score. The scoring model (Fico 8, etc), the bureau data (EX, etc) pulled, and the moment in time that these first 2 criteria are used together. If you're saying that you're looking at an EX F8 score, those are your first 2 pieces of data... so if there's a variance between the two scores you're looking at it can only be the 3rd and final piece of criteria, the time that they were used to produce those scores.

Re: Score Incongruencies

lizmariposa — Tue, 09 Feb 2021 01:50:10 GMT

Nah, I do take it personally. I take it personally that I only have 2% revolving credit usage, that ALL my debts keep going down month after month as I pay over a thousand dollars toward it each month, and that they lowered me 12 frigging points for going from 1% to 2% rate utilization. That seems outrageous and unfair to me to punish someone for playing the game right -- which means their algorythmn is unfair and outrageous, overall, in my perspective. And yeah, it's the SAME bureau, Experiance general score 8.

Re: Score Incongruencies

thornback — Tue, 09 Feb 2021 02:40:35 GMT

@Anonymous i believe OP received a 3B from Experian.com so is referencing their EQ FICO retrieved from the Experian service.

@lizmariposa Your EQ FICO 8 of 688 from myFICO is dated Jan. 10th, as shown in your image. That's nearly a month ago. When did you pull your EQ from Experian.com? - if today, then that pull from Experian.com is your current, accurate Equifax FICO8 score. Something, or multple things, changed on your reports during that time that affected your score. The only way to find out what happened is to compare the reports from the 1/10 pull and the reports you recently obtained from Experian.com

Youre assuming it's due to slightly increased util but it's likely due to something else or a combination of things. You may need to take some time to review and analyze your credit reports line by line to find the change.

Re: Score Incongruencies

lizmariposa — Tue, 09 Feb 2021 02:46:19 GMT

I'm sorry for the confusion. The image you see is my old signature image, from a month ago -- it comes up with every reply. I should just delete it for now. It is NOT my current update to my score for myFICO, which came in today. Both updates for Equifax, (from the Experian.com site) and Equifax (under myFICO) came in today... One says 676, and the other 688. myFICO says my increase on my rate utilization did not change my score. Experian under their site offers not much insight at all.

Re: Score Incongruencies

thornback — Tue, 09 Feb 2021 02:54:49 GMT

@lizmariposa wrote:
I'm sorry for the confusion. The image you see is my old signature image, from a month ago -- it comes up with every reply. I should just delete it for now. It is NOT my current update to my score for myFICO, which came in today. Both updates for Experian (under their site) and Experian (under myFICO) came in today... One says 676, and the other 688. myFICO says my increase on my rate utilization did not change my score. Experian under their site offers not much insight at all.

Okay... 2 questions:

(1) you said earlier that your reports won't be avail on myFICO til 2/10, correct? So the update you received today was due to an alert about a change -- not due to a full 3-bureau update, right?

EDIT: Haha - I see you corrected your post and we are speaking about Equifax. So was the updated score received with a myfico alert (not a 3-bureau update)?

Re: Score Incongruencies

lizmariposa — Tue, 09 Feb 2021 02:57:21 GMT

(1) you said earlier that your reports won't be avail on myFICO til 2/10, correct? So the update you received today was due to an alert about a change -- not due to a full 3-bureau update, right? The 3B won't come down till 2/10. The update I got was an alert for Equifax, through myFICO that my utilization rate had increased 2%, with a balance of $24.

(2) are we talking about your Experian score or your Equifax score? Because earlier you said they issue was your EQ score and now you're saying it's EX... (this may matter if the score in question is, in fact, EQ and the update was received with an alert). I was not doing the best explaining and had to go back and edit my replies. But I was speaking about looking at my Equifax score through Experian.com. Which also updated today.

myFICO says no change to my Equifax. Experian.com says 676 on my Equifax.

I have been monitoring my credit religiously, and every action I've made every month. I don't see how 2% credit utilization merits lowering my score by so much. I have a 28K student loan and I pay $150 on it every month. I have a collection on which I pay $500 every month -- which originally was $2323, and is now $623. That's it. And the reporing on Experian.com (for Equifax) doesn't shed much light at all. There's nothing off or weird.

Re: Score Incongruencies

thornback — Tue, 09 Feb 2021 03:06:05 GMT

@lizmariposa wrote:
(1) you said earlier that your reports won't be avail on myFICO til 2/10, correct? So the update you received today was due to an alert about a change -- not due to a full 3-bureau update, right? The 3B won't come down till 2/10. The update I got was an alert for Equifax, through myFICO that my utilization rate had increased 2%, with a balance of $24.

^^ This is why you see a score discrepancy. And it's not the fault of Equifax, it is a myFICO monitoring issue that has been affecting some users for over a year now. The Equifax FICO 8 scores are not updating with alerts as they should. EQ 8 will only update when a new 3B report is pulled, per your subscription. EX and TU update with alerts as they should.

There are multple threads in the myFICO product feedback subforum on it... it has not been resolved.

https://ficoforums.myfico.com/t5/forums/searchpage/tab/message?q=Equifax%20not%20updating%20on%20myfico&noSynonym=false&collapse_discussion=true

When you pull your 3B on 2/10, your EQ will update and that score, assuming no other report changes occur, should track with what you pulled from Experian.com.

Re: Score Incongruencies

lizmariposa — Tue, 09 Feb 2021 03:08:01 GMT

Ohhh... that makes more sense. Thank you for letting me know that. It still hurts my heart that they would lower me so much over a less than 5% increase of credit utilization. Like I'm never supposed to use my available credit, ever? Maybe I'm being melowdramatic, but I just find it unfair. The other two bureaus did not penalize me, and in fact, Experian raised my credit by 2 pts. When one works hard at these things, saying 'don't take it personal' is not very realistic. lol

Re: Score Incongruencies

thornback — Tue, 09 Feb 2021 03:17:45 GMT

Okay and thats the other thing about myFICO alerts:

The alerts are not necessarily the reason for a score change. The alerts tell you that an alertable event has occurred and the fact that an alert was generated prompts the updating of the score. However, any change in score may have actually occurred at anytime between the last and current update and not necessarily caused by whatever event to which you were alerted.

It is highly doubtful (i dare say impossible) going from 1% to 2% util dropped your score 12 points. Something else happened since your last 3b update and now. You mentioned a collection account, did it get an update to the payment history maybe? You have to do a before and after, line-by-line review of your reports to find the culprit.

Re: Score Incongruencies

lizmariposa — Tue, 09 Feb 2021 03:21:19 GMT

Well, they are not new to my account. And I've been paying them off. The amount is going down, not up. So... paying down a collection wouldn't make a score drop 12 pts. Only recent thing I did was dispute my name on my Equifax, which said "Lizmari M. Collazo/Lizmari" as my legal name. But... they are still investigating that, and haven't even updated my name on their current report.

When my collections went from 1123 to 623, I was raised quite a few points across all my reports. That was as of a few days ago. Now today, I have that 12 point drop. So... I just don't know. I checked the Annual Credit Reports this week, too, and didn't see anything odd. I guess I'll have to wait till the new 3Bs on 2/10, to see if they shed any extra insight.

Re: Score Incongruencies

Anonymous — Tue, 09 Feb 2021 03:32:25 GMT

Paying a collection down from $1000 to $600 or whatever won't increase your score. If you saw score gains it was from something else.

Also to follow up on the point that thornback made in Post 11 regarding score increases not necessarily being tied to alerts, this has been an ongoing misconception for years. I actually started a thread on it because it genuinely bothers me that so many individuals are being mislead. You can see that thread here:

https://ficoforums.myfico.com/t5/myFICO-Product-Feedback/Alerts-unrelated-to-provided-score-changes/td-p/5537890

Re: Score Incongruencies

thornback — Tue, 09 Feb 2021 03:32:37 GMT

@lizmariposa wrote:
Well, they are not new to my account. And I've been paying them off. The amount is going down, not up. So... paying down a collection wouldn't make a score drop 12 pts. Only recent thing I did was dispute my name on my Equifax, which said "Lizmari M. Collazo/Lizmari" as my legal name. But... they are still investigating that, and haven't even updated my name on their current report.

When my collections went from 1123 to 623, I was raised quite a few points across all my reports. That was as of a few days ago. Now today, I have that 12 point drop. So... I just don't know. I checked the Annual Credit Reports this week, too, and didn't see anything odd. I guess I'll have to wait till the new 3Bs on 2/10, to see if they shed any extra insight.

Yes - wait til you pull your 3b and then compare it to the pull from 1/10 - line by line - especially that collection account and note @Anonymous response about paying collections on a payment plan.

And I also want to add - youre not being melodramatic. Rebuilding is a freaking emotional rollercoaster and every point counts - i get it. You have to really try to understand how the FICO scoring system works so you know what to look for when you have sudden changes in score. Could be aging, a negative update to the payment history, utilization/# of cards with a balance, an old, closed account dropping off, etc.-- so many nuanced things could cause your scores to change without warning. Understanding why it happened will help you better manage your feelings and response.

Hang in there!

Re: Score Incongruencies

lizmariposa — Tue, 09 Feb 2021 15:08:29 GMT

I never said that paying down my collections would increase my score a lot (if at all); just that it wouldn't lower it 12 pts or more. There is literally NOTHING I have done on my end to lower it that much. I will know more tomorrow, potentially. But it makes no sense at this point.

Re: Score Incongruencies

thornback — Tue, 09 Feb 2021 15:30:05 GMT

@lizmariposa wrote:
I never said that paying down my collections would increase my score a lot (if at all); just that it wouldn't lower it 12 pts or more. There is literally NOTHING I have done on my end to lower it that much. I will know more tomorrow, potentially. But it makes no sense at this point.

Any update to a collection tradeline can result in a loss of points. Since you are making payments as opposed to paying off in one lump sump, you're guaranteeing a regular update to the tradeline to reflect each payment made. Each update makes the collection look "fresh" to the scoring algorithm and your scores will respond accordingly. Until the balance is $0 and updates cease (or the tradeline is removed), the collection can negatively affect your scores. The effect may vary between the bureaus as they each customize the FICO algorithm to vary in how they weigh such events.

So, while you're not doing anything wrong by paying off your debt, the means by which you pay it off can negatively and inadvertently affect your scores.

Re: Score Incongruencies

lizmariposa — Tue, 09 Feb 2021 16:00:28 GMT

Yeah, I'm not sure that I agree with this. This hasn't been the case at all with ANY of my collection payments with any bureau. It often may even go up 1 point or so, perhaps due to aging of other credit lines. These collections are from 2017, so their impact is not as severe these days. Paying them has never made my score drop -- it has only dropped when I've had a credit utilization rate of more than 10% or so. I mean, I don't mean to seem a contrarian, I just don't think that's the answer right now. I could pay myFICO $20 bucks to take an early peek, but I'll just wait till tomorrw and see what happens. All my scores are now updated on myFICO as of 02/07 at the earliest. So I am suspicious of the Experian.com thing.

Re: Score Incongruencies

thornback — Tue, 09 Feb 2021 16:12:51 GMT

@lizmariposa wrote:
Yeah, I'm not sure that I agree with this. This hasn't been the case at all with ANY of my collection payments with any bureau. It often may even go up 1 point or so, perhaps due to aging of other credit lines. These collections are from 2017, so their impact is not as severe these days. Paying them has never made my score drop -- it has only dropped when I've had a credit utilization rate of more than 10% or so. I mean, I don't mean to seem a contrarian, I just don't think that's the answer right now. I could pay myFICO $20 bucks to take an early peek, but I'll just wait till tomorrw and see what happens. All my scores are now updated on myFICO as of 02/07 at the earliest. So I am suspicious of the Experian.com thing.

I didnt say it was the reason for this 12 point drop. I was simply advising that updates to collection tradelines can result in a score drop so it's something to consider when you are able to review your reports. Just because you haven't experienced it doesn't mean it does not or cannot happen. It is a possibility for anyone with collection tradelines. Typically, if the tradeline is already updating monthly, you will not experience repeated or significant drops. However, if it goes a couple of months without updating and then suddenly updates, a drop can occur.

Re: Score Incongruencies

lizmariposa — Tue, 09 Feb 2021 16:15:51 GMT

It is medical debt, and it is paid monthly on a schedule -- never a missed month. They auto-deduct it.

Re: Score Incongruencies

thornback — Tue, 09 Feb 2021 18:16:18 GMT

@lizmariposa wrote:
It is medical debt, and it is paid monthly on a schedule -- never a missed month. They auto-deduct it.

Was not implying you missed a payment, only that a monthly update to the bureau could be skipped - for whatever reason- collector reporting mishap or bureau delay, which has nothing to do with the actual payments made.

I'm really only trying to offer possible scenarios to look for based on the info you've provided about your profile... not declaring any of them to be the actual cause of your score drop - it could very well be something completely unrelated to the collection. I'm just trying to help by flagging possibilities worth exploring further--