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Balance Decrese, Utilization Decrees and credit score drops.

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Anonymous
Not applicable

Re: Balance Decrese, Utilization Decrees and credit score drops.

What is the list of accounts you have, bank and card name, limit, open balance? Any lates on each of these cards? If so how significant is the late, 30, 60 days or more?

 

Current No Missed Payments

American Express - CL $1000, Bal $150

American Express - CL $10,000, Bal $6000

American Express - CL $5000, Bal $2000

Citi - CL $2000, Bal $1500

 

Negatives from early 2013

Bank of America - $2560 Charge Off, Last early late 2013, According to EX falling off in Feb. 2020
Kohls/CapOne - $1988 Charge Off, Last early late 2013, According to EX falling off in Dec 2019, Was Issued a 1099-C (Cancelation of Debt) but still showing a balance and they told EX that the 1099-C wasnt enough evidence which they sent me.
REMEX INC - $399 Medical Collection Says 2016 but have to have that investigated 
SYNCB/Amer Eagle - $0 Charge Off,Last early late 2013
SYNCB/Care Credit - $10,133 Charge Off, Last late early 2013, According to EX falling off in Dec. 2019

 

Is there a BK anywhere in your past? No

Any accounts sent to collections, which may have refreshed with a collection notice? Not to my knowledge

You say there are three accounts due to age off lates. What is the history of those? All early 2013

Message 11 of 19
Anonymous
Not applicable

Re: Balance Decrese, Utilization Decrees and credit score drops.


@Anonymous wrote:

I ahve attached a copy of my alert showing why it dropped. I cannot make any sense of it either since everything else hasn't changed on my Experian report.

 

https://imgur.com/TgXqylc


An alert is not the reason of a score drop.  An alert is letting you know something changed on your CR.  The alert in this case is absolutely not related to your score change.  It's crucial for you to understand this and also to understand that there has to be another change to your CR that caused the score drop. 

 

MF, it would be really great if after many years of this going on (confused members like the poster above) that you'd finally fix the issue.  It's really getting ridiculous.

Message 12 of 19
SouthJamaica
Mega Contributor

Re: Balance Decrese, Utilization Decrees and credit score drops.


@Anonymous wrote:

@Anonymous wrote:

I ahve attached a copy of my alert showing why it dropped. I cannot make any sense of it either since everything else hasn't changed on my Experian report.

 

https://imgur.com/TgXqylc


An alert is not the reason of a score drop.  An alert is letting you know something changed on your CR.  The alert in this case is absolutely not related to your score change.  It's crucial for you to understand this and also to understand that there has to be another change to your CR that caused the score drop. 

 

MF, it would be really great if after many years of this going on (confused members like the poster above) that you'd finally fix the issue.  It's really getting ridiculous.


+1 It is ridiculous that MyFICO doesn't clear this up, and relies upon us to do it.


Total revolving limits 741200 (620700 reporting) FICO 8: EQ 701 TU 704 EX 685

Message 13 of 19
Anonymous
Not applicable

Re: Balance Decrese, Utilization Decrees and credit score drops.

I'm no expert by any means, but I have been watching my scores closely and trying to repair my credit on my own. It seems that paying credit card balances and lowering your utilization doesn't always equal a higher score, and YES, sometimes your score drops. The only thing that I can think is that someone out there in "Credit Score Creation Land" WANTS you to keep a balance and pay your minimum payment. These card companies are NOT in business FOR YOU! They are in business to MAKE MORE MONEY and the only way to do this is for you to keep a balance on your card and pay them interest. Sadly, I have had this happen to me several times.

Just try to pay off your balance as quickly as possible. And once you've paid it off, KEEP THE CARD! I've made the mistake of closing unused accounts too. You WANT the unused credit lines!

Also, whenever you charge on your card, pay the balance BEFORE the card company reports to the credit bureaus each month. You can actually ask them when they report--- it's the same date each month. Then, either change your due date to make it before the reporting date or just pay the balance before the reporting date each month. I set an alert to remind myself to pay at a certain time. Then it looks like I'm not using the card at all. Also- my card company increases my credit line for multiple concurrent on-time payments. So it's a win-win--- no balance and a higher limit. And the higher limit with a $0 balance increases my score over time. So I guess it's a win-win-win!😉

You just have to play the game to get ahead. The problem is that we, as consumers, usually don't know the rules until we've lost a few games (or seasons). But if you learn the rules and continue to play the game, you CAN win. It just sucks when you're stuck in the loser's bracket for a while though.

***Can you tell I'm playing FANTASY FOOTBALL right now??? My boyfriend would be so proud of my sports analogy!🤣
Message 14 of 19
Anonymous
Not applicable

Re: Balance Decrese, Utilization Decrees and credit score drops.


@Anonymous wrote:
It seems that paying credit card balances and lowering your utilization doesn't always equal a higher score, and YES, sometimes your score drops.

Correct that lowering your utilization doesn't always equal a higher score, because scores only increase when thresholds are crossed.  There's not a linear score gain, like X number of points for Y number of dollars; It doesn't work that way.  Therefore it's perfectly possible that lowering utilization 1%-2% could cause a score increase, but then lowering it another 15% may have no impact on score at all.

 

Incorrect however that lowering your utilization sometimes drops your scores.  The only asterisk to that is if you lower your utilization from an already low amount of (say) 1%-8.9% to 0% [no reported non-zero balances] which can result in a no revolving credit use penalty.  Any other utilization drop from a non-zero percentage to a lower non-zero percentage will not lower a Fico score.  If you believe you've seen that happen, like the previous poster you're being mislead by alerts and/or other changes to your CR caused the change giving you a false positive regarding the utilization [drop] being the reason.

Message 15 of 19
Anonymous
Not applicable

Re: Balance Decrese, Utilization Decrees and credit score drops.

I swear i think Experian is fixed with myfico.My score went up 4 points for the same $117 decrease in my balance on my EQ report.

 

This is all too confusing and seems dumb how they factor this.

 

I even ordered a new report to check the changes and that was the only change as the one stated the $117 decrease on EX

Message 16 of 19
Anonymous
Not applicable

Re: Balance Decrese, Utilization Decrees and credit score drops.

There are tons of changes going on with your CR that aren't alertable.  Just because you don't receive an alert doesn't mean that your report isn't changing week to week.  It is. 

 

You can't say "my score went up for the same $117 decrease" because in doing so you're again making the major mistake in automatically connecting your score change to the alert reason.  As stated many times previously, these two things don't have to be at all releated.

Message 17 of 19
NRB525
Super Contributor

Re: Balance Decrese, Utilization Decrees and credit score drops.


@Anonymous wrote:

I swear i think Experian is fixed with myfico.My score went up 4 points for the same $117 decrease in my balance on my EQ report.

 

This is all too confusing and seems dumb how they factor this.

 

I even ordered a new report to check the changes and that was the only change as the one stated the $117 decrease on EX


Something to keep in mind, if a person has a dirty file, with lates or charge offs of various kinds, the updates and scoring buckets that these baddies are put into, are not fully understood. In a file with no lates, then it's more a matter of aging and utilization, areas that are a little easier to pin down. With lates, it seems every person with some lates has a different mix of timing and severity. Because of this, my opinion is that it is possible a real reason, a clear driver, may not be determined. Since your score headed below 600, that implies some fairly significant refresh of data, perhaps a reported late was updated and became "more recent" through that update. I don't know, I'm just suggesting some possibilities.

 

The good news is, after these baddies fall off in 2020, your scores should start to rise very nicely. When your file has all accounts paid on time, that is when scores start to consistently go up (pending utilization factors and new account factors).

High Bal Jan 2009 $116k on $146k limits 80% Util.
Oct 2014 $46k on $127k 36% util EQ 722 TU 727 EX 727
April 2018 $18k on $344k 5% util EQ 806 TU 810 EX 812
Jan 2019 $7.6k on $360k EQ 832 TU 839 EX 831
March 2021 $33k on $312k EQ 796 TU 798 EX 801
May 2021 Paid all Installments and Mortgages, one new Mortgage EQ 761 TY 774 EX 777
April 2022 EQ=811 TU=807 EX=805 - TU VS 3.0 765
Message 18 of 19
Anonymous
Not applicable

Re: Balance Decrese, Utilization Decrees and credit score drops.

Thanks for the help. I'm hoping the same thing too that once the bad ones drop it will help and bring it back up somewhat. It seems like that is what is killing me the most but luckily I only got a couple months for all negatives to fall off. I hope I can update then and give a positive result.

Message 19 of 19
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