Hello,
Answer to your question
YES Authorized User Accounts factor into your utilization - so this is hurting you. However Utilization has NO memory - so if it were to be paid down it would be 'fixed'
What can you do:
Will she pay it down? - ____
You can contact Chase and have yourself removed as an authorized user. It will stay on your credit report as "terminated" still showing the positive history and change to a 0.00 balance.
OR you can dispute with credit bureauas as NOT MINE and it will PERMANTLY be deleted from your credit file as it is NOT your account - you are just an authorized user.
If you needed the AU account for some reason, I would suggest paying it down to fix the utilization.
Since it sounds like the AU account is of no benefit for you (or for her, or anyone else), I would just get removed as an AU.
Though I would still advise her to pay it down, to help her score.
Good luck!
I had this same issue last year. I was on my dad's PenFed card which was 98% utilized. So I dropped that card like a hot potato covered in lava!
I called PenFed and asked them to please remove me from my dad's account. They said that HE had to request it, since I was just an authorized user on the account. All my dad did was write a letter asking that I be removed from the account, signed it, and emailed it to them. Shortly after, I disputed the account with all 3 bureau's stating that I was no longer an authorized user on the account and to please remove it from my reports.
I'm not sure how it would work with that specific card, but you might have to get her to remove you as an authorized user. If you have online access, you may be able to do it that way? I honestly have no idea and am just spitting out ideas. What I do know, however, is that once you're no longer an authorized user, you can dispute the accounts and remove them from your reports (Ok so maybe you don't even have to remove yourself as an AU, but it's what I did anyways). My score went up quite a bit when I removed my dad's card because it dropped my overall utilization from 90ish% down to like below 10%. His card was doing significant damage to my scores and I didn't even realize it until I found this forum.
Long story short... get rid of that card.
In the OP, you said she's starting to pay the balance down.
But then in a later post, you said she's only making minimum payments.
Technically, making minimum payments is "paying it down", I suppose, but it'll take her 30 years to do it at that rate.
I'd get yourself removed as an AU - at this point, your credit is good on its own, you don't need that account to boost your score anymore. It'll help you sleep better at night, knowing that if she ends up missing payments on it, it won't affect you. And if she never pays it down, your utilization % won't suffer.
My ex-wife and I ended things on great terms, and are still good friends, but there is no way in heck I would consider being an AU on one of her accounts, even though she's historically fairly responsible about her credit. I want to be the only one in control of my credit, it makes me uncomfortable for someone else to have the ability to mess it up, whether intentionally or not. That's the same reason I would never co-sign on a loan for something someone bought and was making payments on themselves - the last thing I need is to find out when I'm applying for a mortgage that there's a repoed car on my credit report.
Total Loan Balance: $43k / $65k
Total SL: $78k