topic Re: Reporting date questions in Rebuilding Your Credit

Reporting date questions

Anonymous — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 20:17:44 GMT

Hi luvandlife,

I’m going to split this off to start a new thread. It gets very confusing when different topics are being discussed in the sane thread. With a new thread you and others will be focused on just your issues. All I’ve changed is the title . If you want to change it to something else just click on “Options” and “Edit Message”.

MarineVietVet, myFICO moderator

I am curious as to how you can find out when the cc company reports to the agencies? And how do we use that to our advantage? How does knowing that information help us? I feel as though I have stumbled accross something good... I am soooo new at this and I am on a serious mission to get my scores improved over the next few months so I am just soaking up everything I find on here.

Thanks in advance for your help!

Re: Reporting date questions

bearsfan34 — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 20:19:10 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
I am curious as to how you can find out when the cc company reports to the agencies? And how do we use that to our advantage? How does knowing that information help us? I feel as though I have stumbled accross something good... I am soooo new at this and I am on a serious mission to get my scores improved over the next few months so I am just soaking up everything I find on here.

Thanks in advance for your help!

What cards do you have? We might just be able to tell you based on our experiences.

Re: Reporting date questions

Anonymous — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 20:19:21 GMT

Capital One

Orchard Bank

Credit One

Re: Reporting date questions

bearsfan34 — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 20:19:32 GMT

Capital One from what I've heard reports when you're statement cuts. So you want to pay your balance down before your statement due date. Say you're statement is 120, pay it down to $10 or whatever so that $10 dollars shows on your CR.

Orchard Bank it use to be the last day of the month it will report whatever balance you have on it. I've heard it changed to a few days after your statement cuts. I've been sock drawering it so I can't be too sure. Hopefully someone else can clarify!

Re: Reporting date questions

Anonymous — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 20:19:43 GMT

Okay, I have due dates of the 21st with Capital One and Credit One bank, I usually pay about 4 days BEFORE the due date. Have I been going about this the wrong way? And with Orchard, my due date is the 1st and I usually pay about 4 days before the 1st... I thought as long as I paid before the due date I was doing good... Apparently there is a method to this madness.

Re: Reporting date questions

bearsfan34 — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 20:19:55 GMT

Have you been paying in full? For everyone it's different, but try to show under 10% utilization. When I first started using my Orchard Bank, I thought it was smart to max it out then pay it off to show I can handle the amount. It wrecked my score because Orchard Bank would update to the CR my maxed amount. So just be careful. I hope that helps. I normally pay about five days ahead just to make sure they have ample time to update my amount. I hope someone else can jump in and clarify the days they report for you though!

Re: Reporting date questions

Anonymous — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 20:20:06 GMT

No, I haven't been paying in full. Im a student so money is really tight, I usually pay the minimum an if I have extra then I apply it toward my balances. Is this hurting me?

I thank you for your contribution by the way...

Re: Reporting date questions

bearsfan34 — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 20:20:17 GMT

No problem! I was once there too. Would you mind posting your credit limits and balances? That way we can figure out your utilization. But if you have a high balance on all and you're only paying the minimum, it is hurting your score.

P.s. Sorry to hijack this thread guys!

Re: Reporting date questions

Anonymous — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 20:20:28 GMT

CapOne credit limit is $500 current balance is $109... I just made a double payment of $50.00

Credit One credit limit is $500 (started at $400, increased to $500 in ONLY 2 months) current balance is $124 (just made a double payment of $50

And the Orchard is out of control right now... Credit limit is $320 current balance is $258 (and I just made an additional payment of $25 today, payment isn't due til the 1st, at which time I will make the minimum payment).

Thanks soooo much for your contributions everyone!

Re: Reporting date questions

Anonymous — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 23:29:37 GMT

Given that you aren't able to pay down the balance. It does not matter when you pay it off. Your credit card utilization rate is the same (except for the amount you pay down). The credit card utilization trick is really only applicable when you can pay off most/all of your credit card debt each month and you are trying to make sure it reports 0 to the CR's instead of what you charged that month.

As for paying it off earlier in the month, I would do it for two reasons:

1) You make sure you are on time with your payments

2) You accrue less interest from the outstanding balance

The best thing you can do is to keep paying down your CCs. When you get your credit card utilization below 30% (take your total debt and divide by total credit available), you should start seeing your credit score rise a lot. Once it rises, I would recommend, you seek 1 or 2 more 0 annual fee credit cards so you raise your total available credit so if you get into debt in the future, it will be a smaller percentage. Your credit score will be highest when your credit card utilization is 3-9%.

Re: Reporting date questions

bearsfan34 — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 23:53:15 GMT

Yeah your utilization is pretty high. It's over 30%. Don't worry I once had to go three months with my uti. at over 90%. But that's because I had a family emergency. It KILLED my score. So try and pay off the cards without using them if you can. Once you get it to below 9 or 10% you'll see such a difference in your score. I wouldn't worry too much about when it reports because you're not carrying a balance then PIF or almost PIF. When you have your cards paid down, I'd keep two at $0 then use one just show usage below 9%. I hope that makes sense. (If I've said something wrong, hopefully someone will correct me)

But I am curious to see if Orchard Bank changed reporting because it's about that time for me to use to show usage.

Re: Reporting date questions

Anonymous — Thu, 16 Feb 2012 02:41:08 GMT

@bearsfan34 wrote:

But I am curious to see if Orchard Bank changed reporting because it's about that time for me to use to show usage.

The 2 agents I spoke with (and the 1 via the online messaging) all said that my OB reports based on the statement date (which in my case is the 5th of the month).

Re: Reporting date questions

randaljon — Thu, 16 Feb 2012 12:03:29 GMT

I have a couple disputes going on with Experian so I am able to look at report daily. I also have some older reports. I matched up what they were reporting with the final day of my statement on the cards. Whatever my balance was at the statement date, that is what was reported to the CRAs...