Hello everyone,
Here is the situation: my husband and I have only one cc, a Chase Rewards from 2005 and that has (until very recently) pretty much always carried a high utilization balance. However, reading these boards has taught me the importance of low utilization and the HUGE effect it can have on your credit. Last year, the husband and I employed the services of one of those credit counselor folks who basically pull your credit reports for you, tell you everything bad on them, and then send out dispute letters and whatnot to try and clean things up. Well, she was happy to take our money, but repeated phone calls over weeks and then months yielded little result, so I found these boards and decided to go on our credit journey alone.
We have finally gotten to a point where that Chase card is paid down to below 30% (from about 90%) and I'm anticipating a fairly sizable bump in our credit scores after it reports at the end of this month, and then I plan on applying for a couple of new cards. We need more credit for higher utilization, and we've been eyeing the Delta Skymiles Amex for a couple of years now. (The husband travels to Japan every summer for three weeks and such a long trip is so much nicer in business class. The skymiles card can help us build up more miles to do that more often, hopefully!)
We've also both joined Scorewatch here. His Eq myFico score is currently 650, and mine is 639. Hoping to see those up in the 670-80's after Chase reports. We have two paid collections on our reports that were SUPPOSED to be removed when we paid them off, but the collection agency didn't follow through and do so, they just updated them as "paid". 
I didn't know enough at the time and only got a verbal agreement over the phone when I paid them. They also both say "disputed" on our report, thanks to the letters that woman we hired sent out last year. I'm not sure where to go from here with them. The company for both of them is Professional Credit Services, and I can't seem to find a contact e-mail for them. Both were medical related - hospital bill from March 2012, and a dermatology bill from September 2011. But the real baddie is a CO from BoA from in July of 2012. (Paid, but settled for a lesser amount when we did so. Again, I had no idea about the fien details of these things when that went down, or we would have handled it entirely differently.) I sent a GW letter last year and was assigned a caseworker, who basically said "too bad" and "it'll drop off in 7 years". Weirdly, it is showing up on the Equifax report, but not my Experian report (haven't checked the husband's to see if it is showing up on his). I was only an authorized user on the account, so maybe they reported it to his and not mine? But it shows up on both of our Eq reports.
Anyway, I am hoping the new lower utilization will give our scores a good bump, and we can apply for that Amex card next month. I'd also like to apply for at least one other while doing the HP. Any suggestions? I've thought about Barclay because of the free credit report, but I've heard they do multiple HP, and randomly do HP throughout the year?? Not thrilled with that idea.
Also, on the myFico simulator, it says the best thing my husband can do to improve his credit is get a higher utilization, and on mine, it says "open a new credit card". Should I apply as the main applicant, and just add him as an authorized user? Should I do one card, and he the other? What is the best way to proceed? I should also mention that he (my husband) is listed as an AU on two of his father's very high limit cc's (20k+), which have less than 10% utilization, yet his simulator still wants his lowered...probably because it hasn't been updated yet to show we paid our Chase card way down.
Gardening until April 30th, 2015.
@suliabryon wrote:Hello everyone,
Here is the situation: my husband and I have only one cc, a Chase Rewards from 2005 and that has (until very recently) pretty much always carried a high utilization balance. However, reading these boards has taught me the importance of low utilization and the HUGE effect it can have on your credit. Last year, the husband and I employed the services of one of those credit counselor folks who basically pull your credit reports for you, tell you everything bad on them, and then send out dispute letters and whatnot to try and clean things up. Well, she was happy to take our money, but repeated phone calls over weeks and then months yielded little result, so I found these boards and decided to go on our credit journey alone.
We have finally gotten to a point where that Chase card is paid down to below 30% (from about 90%) and I'm anticipating a fairly sizable bump in our credit scores after it reports at the end of this month, and then I plan on applying for a couple of new cards. We need more credit for higher utilization, and we've been eyeing the Delta Skymiles Amex for a couple of years now. (The husband travels to Japan every summer for three weeks and such a long trip is so much nicer in business class. The skymiles card can help us build up more miles to do that more often, hopefully!)
We've also both joined Scorewatch here. His Eq myFico score is currently 650, and mine is 639. Hoping to see those up in the 670-80's after Chase reports. We have two paid collections on our reports that were SUPPOSED to be removed when we paid them off, but the collection agency didn't follow through and do so, they just updated them as "paid".
Anyway, I am hoping the new lower utilization will give our scores a good bump, and we can apply for that Amex card next month. I'd also like to apply for at least one other while doing the HP. Any suggestions? I've thought about Barclay because of the free credit report, but I've heard they do multiple HP, and randomly do HP throughout the year?? Not thrilled with that idea.
Also, on the myFico simulator, it says the best thing my husband can do to improve his credit is get a higher utilization, and on mine, it says "open a new credit card". Should I apply as the main applicant, and just add him as an authorized user? Should I do one card, and he the other? What is the best way to proceed? I should also mention that he (my husband) is listed as an AU on two of his father's very high limit cc's (20k+), which have less than 10% utilization, yet his simulator still wants his lowered...probably because it hasn't been updated yet to show we paid our Chase card way down.
Hi Suliabryon,
welcome me to the forums! I would wait a little longer on the Amex. You might want your credit scores to be hire, and I'm not sure if they are C/O friendly Especially with it being recent.
I have a Barclays card and they do soft pulls (so do other credit card companies) no one can do a hard pull without your verbal consent. They check your TU (but could check another credit agency), and I had a 608 with 1 paid and 1 unpaid collection with some charge offs. I got the NFL Visa card. They gave me 500 limit, and in 5 months got an auto increase to 2 grand. So far they've been great!
Wow, thanks for the replies everyone. I will follow your advice and keep working on those GW letters. It is a little disheartening, but the wisdom on these boards has already helped out a lot, and I'll continue with that in mind. Part of the problem is, I can't seem to find contact info for Professional Credit Services (the collection agency for both of those paid collections). But I'll keep looking. As for BoA and the CO - I'm not even sure what to do with that. They were so adamant the last time I contacted them. I guess it's try and try again.
As far as the trips to Japan and Delta - they are the ONLY direct flight from PDX to Japan, and have been for several years. The husband has done the one-stop flights before, and it turns a 10 hour international flight into a 14 hour international flight. He isn't interested in doing the one-stop flights anymore unless he has no other choice. So, Delta it is, at least for now.
maiden_girl - I do not expect anyone else to fix my credit problems. It was very clear very quickly that the woman wasn't doing anything we couldn't do ourselves, simply by following the advice on these forums. I'm not expecting someone to magically repair anything for me, just to be clear. The utilization should be under 10% by next month. Two at the most.
The Chase card has a $1500 limit.
Sent a GW letter to the CA with the two paid collections today. *fingers crossed* Also composing a new GW letter to BoA. Not a lot of hope they will budge, but it never hurts to try.
The good news is, that CO doesn't show on my Experian report, so I should be able to qualify for that Delta Skymiles Amex after we get our utilization down and hopefully those two collections get deleted. We shall see!
