practical value of a huge credit limit?

[tacpoly]

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@Thomas_Thumb wrote:

Side note: If a card has not been used for over 3 months, it may have been tagged as inactive. There are some posts that suggest a card that has been inactive 6 months or more may cause a score drop when 1st re-activated. This has not been adequately validated but, would be worth noting if the reported data includes such a card.

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That last point is really interesting.  As I mentioned before, I would only get sporadic alerts from Equifax, but on November 6, I was notified of a 13 point drop in my Eq Fico 8 score (took me out of the 800's) when "an account that's been inactive for more than 4 months has become recently active".  Previous activity was listed at 6/1/2016 with the newly reported activity on 10/1/2016.  Note:  Experian, for the same activity, increased my score by 4 points on Nov 5.  Nothing from Transunion. 

[tacpoly]

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@JLK93 wrote:

If I understand correctly, you went from <1% overall utilization to approximately 3% overall utilization.

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 No, I went from <1% to over 9% (roughly 16k out of 170k aggregate cl).

[Thomas_Thumb]

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@tacpoly wrote:

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@JLK93 wrote:

If I understand correctly, you went from <1% overall utilization to approximately 3% overall utilization.

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 No, I went from <1% to over 9% (roughly 16k out of 170k aggregate cl).

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Aggregate utilization crossing above 9.00% is a known Fico score drop threshold. That would be a much more likely suspect than an individual card reporting 14% utilization. This does suggest your $50k card(s) are factoring into aggregate utilization on Fico 08. However, other testing would be needed to validate. A more detailed accounting of balance make-up as it related to before/after scores would be helpful as multiple cards are involved in the $16k.

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@tacpoly wrote:

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@Thomas_Thumb wrote:

Side note: If a card has not been used for over 3 months, it may have been tagged as inactive. There are some posts that suggest a card that has been inactive 6 months or more may cause a score drop when 1st re-activated. This has not been adequately validated but, would be worth noting if the reported data includes such a card.

---

That last point is really interesting.  As I mentioned before, I would only get sporadic alerts from Equifax, but on November 6, I was notified of a 13 point drop in my Eq Fico 8 score (took me out of the 800's) when "an account that's been inactive for more than 4 months has become recently active".  Previous activity was listed at 6/1/2016 with the newly reported activity on 10/1/2016.  Note:  Experian, for the same activity, increased my score by 4 points on Nov 5.  Nothing from Transunion. 

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P.S. As for inactive accounts becoming active and impacting score (or not) that is something CRAs may be able to tweak to suit their taste. Those that have reported a related score drop also mention the drop is short lived - gone next reporting cycle.

[Anonymous]

Hello JLK!  In response to the CRA-dependent idea, you write:

I think this idea stems from a time then myFICO sold EQ04 and TU98.

The CRA-dependent idea is not a strong assertion on my end.  It's just me (and BBS) reminding folks of one of the virtues of using a testing tool like the $1 free trial at Credit Check Total.  We'd get an instant snapshot off all three reports and all three scores and would definitively rule out (or less likely, confirm) the idea that the FICO 8 model at each CRA might have a different cutoff for what constitutes a big CL.

We do know FICO 8 differs algorithmically at each CRA -- a direct pull of all three CRA's scores would answer whether the big CL cutoff is one such way,

PS.  Thanks for making clear many posts back that there is a simple test for finding the big CL cutoff.  I have repeated your suggestion a good three times or so as the thread has progressed and different people have joined it.

[Anonymous]

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@tacpoly wrote:

I have Fico 3B monitoring with alerts.  When a significant balance reports on my credit card with >$50K limit, my scores drop.  For example, my cc reported a $7900 balance this month (14% util for that cc vs $865 last month, 1% cc util); my Experian Fico 8 score immediately dropped 10 points, my Transunion score dropped 5 points, no change with Equifax*.  The reporting of that balance was the only change.  This suggests that my 50+K limit cc utilization is being reported.  I have 2 other cc lines over and 2 lines below 30K. 

* I wouldn't conclude anything from Eq scores not changing.  All my credit reports are frozen and Eq seems to be more sensitive to this than the other credit reporting agencies.  3B monitoring only gets sporadic score updates from Eq.  Whether this is because of their algorithm or Fico not having access, I don't know. 

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Hi TacPoly!  Would you be willing to execute the JLK test on your tradeline with the big CL?  (> 50k)

It's extremely cheap -- would cost you only $2. Just as a reminder, that test is this.

If a person has multiple cards, with one of them being at 50k (say)....

     * He keeps all cards reporting $0, except for the 50k card and a smaller card (e.g. 10k).

     * He gets each of those two cards reporting a small balance ($100 say), waiting until he's sure the CRA reports are updated.

     * He pulls his three FICO 8 scores (e.g. with Credit Check Total).

     * He pays the 10k card down to $0 leaving just the 50k card reporting. 

     * He waits till he is sure the new balances are reporting (all zero except the 50k card),

     * Then he pulls his three FICO 8 scores again.

If the result is a big score plunge then we know for sure that the 50k card is being excluded by FICO 8 in its utilization calculation.

In your case, the "50k" card is actually 52k or something like that.

[Anonymous]

Hello TacPoly.... I will be sending you a private message about this as well, but have you decided whether you'd be willing to execute the JLK test on your big CL tradeline?  The one that has a CL bigger than 50k?

[Anonymous]

To summarize where we are as far as upcoming tests, I believe the foillowing is in motion.

*  Contributors ICED and 909 will be testing tradelines that have a CL of exactly 50k. 

*  Contributors JLK and TacPoly will be testing tradelines that have a CL of greater than 50k.

Results should be coming in during the next 15-45 days.

I will be sending out private messages to all of these folks today to confirm.  If they see this post, they should feel free to chime in publicly.

[tacpoly]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Hello TacPoly.... I will be sending you a private message about this as well, but have you decided whether you'd be willing to execute the JLK test on your big CL tradeline?  The one that has a CL bigger than 50k?

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All 3 of my CR are frozen so I won't be able to pull scores.  The best I can do is post my scores from my 3B alerts.

[Anonymous]

You can execute the test without using CCT.  The steps are the same.  Just, in place of "pull your scores with CCT" it would be "wait for the new balances to trigger the alerts."

[909]

I'm in, but my test is a bit less intentional so here's what it will look like:

11/14 3B: 7 revolvers, CL of $71,250, one card with a balance of $161 (Barclays w/$2K CL)
Fico8: EQ 800; TU 783; EX 791

12/xx 3B: 7 revolvers, CL of about $107,250 (3 cards received CLs: $6K to $9K; $6,250 to $9,250; $20K to $50K); one card with a balance, the $50K AMEX, will have a balance of about $1K.

I didn't pull a 3B report when the $50K AMEX and $2K Barclays both reported balances in late November.

I hope this will be helpful. (Now I just have to make sure the other cards don't post a random balance from an auto-pay or some other use.)