Score increased 42 pts.....

[doedoe]

Hello all I'm new to the fourms and decided to post my situation, because I really dont understand it.

I got an alert from fico today that said my score went up 42pts. I logged on to myfico to see what happen and it says that I got a 42pt. increase because my high balance has changed.

It is my Capital One card. Last month my CL was 600.00 and my balance was 20.00. Well a couple weeks ago I logged on to my account and they gave me a CLI to 1500.00. I didnt even ask for it.

Ok, so now my CL is 1500.00 and my balance is 542.00

Myfico is saying that the 542.00 balance made my score go up 42pts. I dont understand it. I thought the best way to make your score go up is to have less than 10% util.?

BTW Nothing else has changed on my credit reports.

Whats your guys opinon?

[blackswan22]

Im no expert but m advice would be to stay far away from the credit limit charging only want you can pay the next month to show a steady repayment history and that you are responsible enough to not go over or to close to your limit. Good luck and enjoy those points! Hey if you dont want em you can always send them my way :-)

[llecs]

Congrats on the jump and the CLI.

Has the $542 balance reported on your reports yet? ....Something doesn't sound right. Your balance was $20 on $600 or 3.3% Util. Your balance reported the same (assumption here) of $20 on $1500, due to the new CLI, or 1.3%. A 2% difference wouldn't give a 42 pt jump on EQ (at least not below 10% util overall. Did you pull your report after this change? I bet there was something else that popped off your report to cause this. Or, maybe, you have other cards in which a $900 CLI overall would bring down your total utilization.

[doedoe]

Here is a copy of what Fico says it is 556.00 not 542.00:

Alert: Your FICO® score has gone up

Score Watch alert/Changes to your FICO® Score  

Your FICO® score has gone up to 608 on January 2, 2008.Interest rate alert: Your new score of 608 may qualify you for a new interest rate of .
Rate as of January 2, 2008 for a hloan . See interest rates for all FICO® scores.

Changes to your credit report  

This jump in your FICO® score happened on the same day as a change on your Equifax Credit Report™ which triggered an alert. It's likely that the change in your credit report caused your score to go up, but this is not always the case. Your score may have changed for other reasons, such as paying back your debts responsibly, which isn't always reported as a credit alert. Also, as factors that were hurting your score get older, they have less of a negative impact on your score. In addition, if multiple changes on the credit report happened on the same day, some may have hurt the score while others helped it.

1 of your accounts reported balance increases

CAPITAL ONE  (XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX8)
New balance: $556

Show/Hide Details

Account opened: 9/2007
Description: Credit card
Amount in H/C column is credit limit


  Previously reported Newly reported Account balance: $20 $556
You received this alert because this balance increase of $536 (2680% of previous balance) exceeded your alert limit of $5. You can change the settings for this kind of alert here.

Contact: CAPITAL ONE, PO Box 85520, Internal Zip 12030-163, Richmond, VA, 232855520

How balance increases impact your score: A balance increase on an account may lower your FICO® score.

A large balance on an account, or balances on many accounts, can be a sign that you may be having trouble paying back debts. Since your FICO® score measures the chances that you will pay back a debt, larger balances or balances on more accounts can lower your score.

"Maxing out" a credit card or other line of credit is when the balance on the account comes close to the account's credit limit. This can dramatically lower your FICO® score because it is often a sign of a consumer who desperately needs credit and may not be able to pay it back.

The drop in your FICO® score caused by a balance increase can be reversed by paying down the balance.

Ok, Also I checked my CR on TC and my CR has been updated but only on EQ.

[Anonymous]

that's strange. did anyone else notice that it says "The drop in your FICO® score caused by a balance increase..." when the score went up? i hope this isn't an error that when corrected will result in a score drop... I'd keep a close eye on this...

[llecs]

There's got to be something more here. You should pull your EQ report and see if there are any other changes (e.g. deleted negatives, lower util% excluding CapOne, deleted lates, better acct age, etc. Scorewatch has only caught about 25% of the changes to my reports.

If nothing has changed, then I'm stumped.

[doedoe]

I checked my EQ report and everything is still the same, except for the change on the Cap1 balance.

Even if it changes back because of an error or something like that, its ok I just loved the feeling of even passing 600. I know that its not a good score but still

I just thought it was weird because of the high util.

[Adalen]

My account reported the same thing, I thought it was weird.  My EQ score only went up 4 points, but it was accompanied with a  balance increase "warning" stating that my score could go down due to a blanace increase on one of my credit cards. 

I'm can only assume the one is not related to the other... but I haven't the slightest clue.

[Anonymous]

The reason you probably went up in score could be a number of things, like age. It says that your score went up on the same day that something reported, it didn't say it went up because of that. You never know, your Cap1 card prob hit one of the golden 3m, 6m, 9m, 12m, age marks.