High Balance more than Credit Limit - Ways to Resolve

[Anonymous]

My question is two-part:

First off, on a couple of my credit cards, the high balance is higher than the actual credit limit due to going over. Does this have any impact on my credit score if balance is not currently over the limit?

Secondly, if I get the credit limit increased on those cards so that the limit is higher than what the max was previously, will this help my credit score?

Thanks in advance, this is a great forum!

[Anonymous]

No it doesn't affect credit score negatively. In the past few years, many people have reallocated credit limits among several cards or had CLDs, and they also show a "high balance" which exceeds their current CL. 

Your score won't benefit if your CL is increased to exceed your "high balance", unless that change affects your utilization significantly ...

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the reply...I was hoping it wasn't as I didn't want to have to put any hard pulls on my credit report in order to get the limits increased.

Much appreciated.

[GregB]

I was very concerned about this also on one account. I had closed an account that had a small balance due to a payment that had not posted yet. They closed it in two steps, reducing the limit to $200 until the payment posted. When the account closed it reported the limit as being $200 and the high credit being about $18,000. This was so far out of balance that I called them. They claimed it had no negative effect on my credit. It appears to have had no effect other than looking strange on my report.

[Anonymous]

Thanks Greg!