How accurate is Score Watch ?? 726 v. 657 **bleep**.

[Anonymous]

According to Score Watch, my credit score was 726 as of 9/9/12. I applied for a Nordstrom card that day and got denied! The letter they sent says they pulled my Equifax on 9/9/12 which reported a 657 !!!!!! How is that even possible?! That's a 69 point difference. As of 9/12/12 (only 3 days later) Score Watch sent me an alert that my credit was at 791 !! 

Why am I paying for this service if it is THAT inaccurate ?! Or did Nordstrom mess up and pull the wrong report or something ?!!! Not sure what happened here or what I should do to appeal to Nordys. I have the inquiry on my credit report so I'd at least like to get a card from them. I had zero inquiries for 2 years before this major bummer.

[dude11]

Best guess is that Nordstrom may have given you a FAKO score or in other words not a FICO score. Did the later state FICO anywhere? How about a score range?

[aussiesareforever]

I agree. Many lenders use their own scores (non FICO) so looking to see if the number says FICO or if they provided a score range will be helpful.

[LionLaw]

Yeah but with a FICO of 726, there's no way the OP should have been denied for a Nordstrom's card.  You might have a split file, or the lender otherwise just pulled the wrong report. 

[LionLaw]

Here's an easy way to tell if they pulled the right report: did you get an alert from Scorewatch that you had a new inquiry?

[GregB]

First, I would double check and make sure that Nordstroms pulled Equifax.

Second, did you ever default on an account that might be associated with Nordstroms or the issuer of the account?

I would not agree that a FICO of 726 would be good enough that you can assume automatic approval. That is just slightly above the median score and there are other factors involved. They may have an issue with utilization, length of history, or other factors on your report. These may be included in their scoring model differently.

[Anonymous]

I ended up getting the card.....and yes I received alerts BOTH times they pulled my credit on EQ ! I still have no idea how the heck they got a 657. I haven't had a score that low in almost a year. When I got denied, I wrote a recon letter and enclosed a copy of the EQ report I pulled just a week later directly from Equifax that showed a score of 714. They pulled my credit again to verify I guess and my EQ score came up as 719 so I got the card. $5k flexible limit but kinda bummed they pulled my score a second time even though I never requested/authorized it. I would think that it would be a soft pull at least but nope......2 hards now UGH. I think Nords inquiries drop after 6 months though so that's better than 2 years at least....but still. I had 0 EQ inq for 3 years !

[HiLine]

Your Score Watch FICO score is based on the model used by mortgage lenders. Credit card lenders use a different FICO scoring model, which can give a tremendously different score from what Score Watch gives you.

[Anonymous]

<< DUMMY. Yeah, I didn't realize....I only pull directly from each CRA now. Next card I apply for I'm going to order directly from each CRA so I can get a more accurate picture of what's going on. I didn't think the scores could be THAT off. 50-75+ is excessive IMO.

[HiLine]

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@Anonymous wrote:

<< DUMMY. Yeah, I didn't realize....I only pull directly from each CRA now. Next card I apply for I'm going to order directly from each CRA so I can get a more accurate picture of what's going on. I didn't think the scores could be THAT off. 50-75+ is excessive IMO.

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My highest difference so far has been 45 or so. Not too far off that range.