Credit Monitoring

[Anonymous]

hi all

Are there any monitoring services out there that will explain why your score may have gone up or down? I use experian service and i noticed my score went up 3 points yesterday, then went down 4 points today without explaining why.

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymous wrote:

hi all

Are there any monitoring services out there that will explain why your score may have gone up or down? I use experian service and i noticed my score went up 3 points yesterday, then went down 4 points today without explaining why.

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Often its simply impossible to say what causes a given score change. Your reports change constantly, aven with "no changes" because everything ages, and a lot of FICO is based on age of each item.

[Anonymous]

Hello,

I use Credit Sesame to monitor my credit.  They have a free service that provides your score as well as monitor your credit through TransUnion.  The great thing about their alerts is that it gives you details of what it is and where it came from so you can see how these events can affect your score.  I use their Pro Credit membership that allows me to receive my scores and reports from all three bureaus as well as monitoring from all three.  

There are many reasons as to why your credit score may drop or rise.  I use this service because it lays everything out for me in an organized way and I always know when something happens to my credit.

[takeshi74]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Are there any monitoring services out there that will explain why your score may have gone up or down? I use experian service and i noticed my score went up 3 points yesterday, then went down 4 points today without explaining why.

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You cannot rely on a service.  For any scoring change you need to carefully compare reports from before and after the change.  A score is generated based on the data in a report.  However, you have to keep in mind that it's not just additions and deletions that lead to changes.  Effects such as aging also have an impact on scores.

I'd recommend not obsessing over such small changes and setting a threshold that won't drive you nuts with the normal ebb and flow of score changes.  At least 20 points is my recommendation.  Small changes in reported utilization can cause something like that.  Again, you'd have to carefully compare reports to see.

[Anonymous]

myfico.com monitoring is stellar! Every single fico score change (the only score that really matters) I've experienced has been associated with an "alert" notification. Granted it costs money but if real credit scores are something you care about alot then then it's a small price to pay.