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What were your balances before the score decreases? If you increased the number of positive balances and had higher balances, that's generally enough to ding your score. The Experian FICO 8 has a reputation for being a little more patient about this kind of stuff.
Good question from HO above, as I was thinking the same thing. It appears you provided your "after" balances, but without the "before" balances it's impossible to compare and attempt to determine what may have caused your score shift(s).
Depending on the score, anytime you have more than one card/account with a balance, there's potential for a decrease.
Also, there are some who report dings before reaching 8.9%/28.9%. It's possible that those dings may come due to "balances too high" or "amounts owed too high." I get both of those reason codes on one of my scores despite the fact that I'm only reporting $400 on a single card with a 24k limit. The one lone FICO with those two reasons is two points lower than it was with a $200 balance on a single card with a 7k limit.
@Caught750 wrote:
I’m fairly certain the number of accounts reporting stayed the same or may have increased by one. The amounts did increase but I’m not positive what they were as I hadn’t been tracking them closely since I just PIF. I don’t understand the drop since I haven’t crossed anything that’s discussed a “threshold” here (sub 8.9% aggregate, sub 28.9% single card, less than 1/3 of accounts).
We don't know everything there is to know about thresholds. We are pretty sure overall should be kept at 9% or less and individual should be kept at 28% or less, but there are sometimes moves based on utilization below those numbers. I certainly have detected, in my own profile, that there is a scoring difference in FICO 8 between 9% overall utilization and 1%.
@HeavenOhio wrote:Depending on the score, anytime you have more than one card/account with a balance, there's potential for a decrease.
Also, there are some who report dings before reaching 8.9%/28.9%. It's possible that those dings may come due to "balances too high" or "amounts owed too high." I get both of those reason codes on one of my scores despite the fact that I'm only reporting $400 on a single card with a 24k limit. The one lone FICO with those two reasons is two points lower than it was with a $200 balance on a single card with a 7k limit.
Which score?
EX FICO 2 / 3 are the only ones I've anything like that on and that was for a 27k balance hanging out on a 28k HELOC or so.
@Caught750 wrote:
Silliness I tell ya. Follow the rules, as we understand them, and still get dinged.
With all the really nice cards you have, what is the point of worrying about a few points here? Your main weighting is now internal score, and I can't imagine many other cards need to be apped.
AR is indeed giving you excellent rewards, and that seems worth a few points if you dont want to pre-pay before month end.
@Revelate wrote:
@HeavenOhio wrote:Depending on the score, anytime you have more than one card/account with a balance, there's potential for a decrease.
Also, there are some who report dings before reaching 8.9%/28.9%. It's possible that those dings may come due to "balances too high" or "amounts owed too high." I get both of those reason codes on one of my scores despite the fact that I'm only reporting $400 on a single card with a 24k limit. The one lone FICO with those two reasons is two points lower than it was with a $200 balance on a single card with a 7k limit.
Which score?
EX FICO 2 / 3 are the only ones I've anything like that on and that was for a 27k balance hanging out on a 28k HELOC or so.
Equifax 04 (FICO 5) Bankcard
March 18
$200 balance on a 7k limit card
819
April 8
all zero
813
April 12
$400 balance on a 24k limit card
817
A full list of scores for those dates along with comments on the weird scores (with reason codes) are in my recent AZ thread.