Dropped Utilization from 34% to 8% and only changed by 1 point.

[Anonymous]

I logged into my Experian Account this morning to see that I had an alert letting me know my Fico8 Score increased 1 point from 633 to 634. I paid off 3 store cards that were reporting a balance and Walmart also reported my new CLI from $200 to $5,000. my UTI is now 8%. 

I do have 3 Cards reporting a Balance. 

Credit 1- $4 of $450. I paid this card off so I am not exactly sure why a $4 balance was reported. 

Victoria Secret- $536 of $700- I'm working on paying this down, and also my B&BW candle addiction...

Total Visa- $189 of $350

I realize I need to pay these down but I really thought dropping my overall utilization this much would make more of an impact. 

Anyone have any insight on this? 

[Anonymous]

FICO penalties are not additive it seems, so the overall "utilization" penalty appears to be more based on whatever utilization may penalize you the most.

So if your aggregate penalty here is 0 points but you have some individual penalties of 30 points for being at 76% on one account and 54% on another account, you may not see much movement for getting your aggregate down to 8%.

Plus the number of cards penalty might be a few points more if you're reporting on 50% or more of revolvers.

Congrats on getting your balances down, and FICO will celebrate once you get those two high cards down below 28% each.

[marty56]

If I remember correctly TU seems to be sensitive to # CCs reporting a balance and EX to total % util or the highest % util on a single card.

[topgunvf]

When I first started to attack my utilization and become "AZEO" I noticed a minimal gain on EX as well when all cards (5 at the time) were ZERO UTI except one but was over 39% yet overall was less than 8.9%. Read up and did my homework and a special thanks to @ABCD2199 for his links and shot right up as soon as my last card was less than 8.9% and reported a balance. Congrats so far on your progress OP and keep at it!

-B

[Anonymous]

I used ABCD's pointers, and paid down my utilization.  I got about a 40 point bump when I did this!!