All zero except one with a store card

[folks19]

I now have 3 credit cards, but 1 of them is a store card (Amazon). Would the AZEO technique work to the same extent if one card is a store card? Does it matter which card has the small balance?

[Anonymous]

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@folks19 wrote:

I now have 3 credit cards, but 1 of them is a store card (Amazon). Would the AZEO technique work to the same extent if one card is a store card? Does it matter which card has the small balance?

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You need to leave the small balance on the bank card and not the store or charge card.

[Anonymous]

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@folks19 wrote:

I now have 3 credit cards, but 1 of them is a store card (Amazon). Would the AZEO technique work to the same extent if one card is a store card? Does it matter which card has the small balance?

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The answer really is "it depends."  Some people implement AZEO with a store card and it "works" just fine, where others encounter the AZ penality meaning that the store card isn't being "counted" toward revolving credit use.  Using a major bank card however always gets the job done, which is why it's always recommended to use one over a store card that may or may not work.  Better safe than sorry.

[Anonymous]

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@folks19 wrote:

I now have 3 credit cards, but 1 of them is a store card (Amazon). Would the AZEO technique work to the same extent if one card is a store card? Does it matter which card has the small balance?

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@folks19 excellent question. At Equifax there is a score loss for not having a balance on a national bankcard. There is also apparently a penalty for having a balance on a retail card. 

I think Experian also tracks retail Balances. 

So the effect at Equifax is you would lose points for not having a balance on a national bankcard and you would lose points for having a balance on a retail card, so it wouldn't be a good idea there. 

May I suggest you peruse the Scoring Primer linked at the top of my thread?

[HeavenOhio]

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@Anonymous wrote:
The answer really is "it depends."  Some people implement AZEO with a store card and it "works" just fine, where others encounter the AZ penality meaning that the store card isn't being "counted" toward revolving credit use.  Using a major bank card however always gets the job done, which is why it's always recommended to use one over a store card that may or may not work.  Better safe than sorry.

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There's a third scenario, which is losing a few points without getting the full AZEO penalty. That's what happened to me.

[Anonymous]

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@HeavenOhio wrote:

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@Anonymous wrote:
The answer really is "it depends."  Some people implement AZEO with a store card and it "works" just fine, where others encounter the AZ penality meaning that the store card isn't being "counted" toward revolving credit use.  Using a major bank card however always gets the job done, which is why it's always recommended to use one over a store card that may or may not work.  Better safe than sorry.

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There's a third scenario, which is losing a few points without getting the full AZEO penalty. That's what happened to me.

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yes that's due to the other penalties I explained. I also appeared to get a partial loss rather than a full loss before I discovered the above.

[folks19]

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@Anonymous wrote:

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@folks19 wrote:

I now have 3 credit cards, but 1 of them is a store card (Amazon). Would the AZEO technique work to the same extent if one card is a store card? Does it matter which card has the small balance?

---

@folks19 excellent question. At Equifax there is a score loss for not having a balance on a national bankcard. There is also apparently a penalty for having a balance on a retail card. 

I think Experian also tracks retail Balances. 

So the effect at Equifax is you would lose points for not having a balance on a national bankcard and you would lose points for having a balance on a retail card, so it wouldn't be a good idea there. 

May I suggest you peruse the Scoring Primer linked at the top of my thread?

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Wait... but I thought the score is generated by FICO not by Experian and Equifax?

[Anonymous]

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@folks19 wrote:

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Wait... but I thought the score is generated by FICO not by Experian and Equifax?

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[Fico] scores are generated using the Fico algorithm and provided by whatever source you get them from.  Those scores are drawn from whichever bureau data (EX, EQ, TU) is used. 

[Anonymous]

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@HeavenOhio wrote:

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There's a third scenario, which is losing a few points without getting the full AZEO penalty. That's what happened to me.

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Cool, can you elaborate a bit more on that?  Are you able to quantify the difference between bankcard AZEO, storecard AZEO and AZ on your profile?  Also, what was the specific store card that you used? 

I've only got 1 store card (Lowe's) and am pretty sure at some point I've used it as my AZEO card and don't recall ever seeing a partial AZ drop... so perhaps it depends on which specific store card or something?

[folks19]

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@Anonymous wrote:

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@folks19 wrote:

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Wait... but I thought the score is generated by FICO not by Experian and Equifax?

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[Fico] scores are generated using the Fico algorithm and provided by whatever source you get them from.  Those scores are drawn from whichever bureau data (EX, EQ, TU) is used. 

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But I thought @Anonymous was saying that Equifax and Experian themselves penalties the use of a store card. I thought that the credit bureaus just provide the data, and FICO (or Vantage or any other scoring model) then creates a score based on its algorithm. I didn't think that EX and EQ (and TU or any other credit bureau) are actually involved in the algorithm which is used to generate the score.