Creditor going out of business: FICO effect (Blispay)

[Anonymous]

What effect does a bank closing have on your FICO score? Since I'm pretty sure Blispay is going out of business soon, would we be better off closing the card or just letting them axe it.

[K-in-Boston]

In most cases, no effect, unless it affects your overall utilization.  If it has a balance on it, the answer is a little more complex and the effect would depend on how the credit report is reported: original (best case), same as balance (ouch), $0 (double ouch) or not reported (varies).  Whether you close it or the lender does will have no difference; upon a manual review a future lender may inquire as to why it was closed.

[DaveInAZ]

Out of curiosity what makes you say Blispay is probably going out of business? I did a search for "Blispay is going out of business" and didn't get any hits. I don't have Blispay, read too much about their haphazard ID verification and have other credit accounts for 2% rewards or deferred interest.

[K-in-Boston]

@DaveInAZ  "It" has apparently hit the fan:

https://ficoforums.myfico.com/t5/Credit-Cards/Blispay-Suspending-future-purchases/td-p/5413514

[DaveInAZ]

Ouch! I was on the CC forum early but apparently "it" hadn't hit the fan yet. Not very promising when a CC issuer runs out of $$$ to approve new purchses right before the start of holiday shopping.

[UncleB]

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@K-in-Boston wrote:

In most cases, no effect, unless it affects your overall utilization.  If it has a balance on it, the answer is a little more complex and the effect would depend on how the credit report is reported: original (best case), same as balance (ouch), $0 (double ouch) or not reported (varies).  Whether you close it or the lender does will have no difference; upon a manual review a future lender may inquire as to why it was closed.

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+1

Something else to consider is that the last time I checked Blispay is still only reporting to EX, so assuming that's still the case you only have to be concerned with the utilization on one bureau rather than three. 

[K-in-Boston]

Typo: credit report should have been credit line.

[RonM21]

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@K-in-Boston wrote:

@DaveInAZ  "It" has apparently hit the fan:

https://ficoforums.myfico.com/t5/Credit-Cards/Blispay-Suspending-future-purchases/td-p/5413514

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Wow this is interesting.  I remember when Blispay first came out and was the hot attraction for a short period of time.  It seemed tempting to go for at that time, but something told me to hold off and see how this plays out first, especially when I was seeing info brought forward about no CLI's and so on.