@Anonymous wrote:
Hey I’m new to this forum and new entirely to trying to better my credit score. In the past I have made some mistakes and didn’t know how the system worked so of course I charged and applyed for credit cards never made some payments on time etc. Over these couple years I have applied first for OpenSky credit card to start rebuilding my credit. It’s a secured card with only 200 limit. I have had this for a year now and been paying on time every since. I then applied for another card..Discover secured card ($200)and it’s been seven months since I had that. I finally got a review and happy to say the increased the limit to $2000 and made the card unsecured. I also several months later applied for a capital one card unsecured with a limit of 300 dollars. I don’t want to ramble on too much but I just want see where I can find my actual credit scores. On my credit karma account I’m seeing 637 /634 trans and equifax. Then i look at my Experian account (free) and it says much lower at 599 equifax 593 trans and 581 experian. Why are these numbers different? I hope someone can take the time to read this and give some feedback or advice on where I can look for the actual scores. Another thing will the increase credit limit on my discover from 200 to 2000 make a big impact positively on my score ? Thanks for reading and any help will be appreciated.
Discover gives you your actual TransUnion FICO 8 score.
Hi Scuba - welcome to the forums!
@Anonymous wrote:
On my credit karma account I’m seeing 637 /634 trans and equifax. Then i look at my Experian account (free) and it says much lower at 599 equifax 593 trans and 581 experian. Why are these numbers different?
Ignore credit karma scores, they are of the Vantage 3 model and are very different from FICO scores (and quite useless). FICO is the score model lenders use to make credit decisions -- this is the score you want to monitor. Your scores from the Experian site (even the free / trial Experian service) should be your FICO 8 scores, which are the ones with which you want to concern yourself. You can (should) double check that they are FICO 8 scores by looking for the FICO® sign next to the scores in the Experian app (they do offer a free Experian Plus score as well, which is not FICO -- so that's why I recommend you confirm that the scores say FICO 8 next to them).
What else is on your reports? You said you made some mistakes in the past with late payments, etc., so what negatives are still appearing on your reports? If you can list every account that is negative, and what the negative actually is (ie. late pays, charge-off, collections, etc.) we will be able to offer better advise on how to rebuild. Please also list the names of the creditors / collection agecies and any outstanding balances associated with each.
You're off to a good start with your new credit.. so all you need to do there is maintain and let them age -- you don't need any more new accounts for now.
