EQ 850 Data Points

[JLK93]

 An inquiry aged past the 1 year mark on my Equifax report today and my EQ 08 FICO score rose from 846 to 850. I still have 1 inquiry in the last year.

My EQ FICO 9 was already at 850 with 3 inquiries. My Experian FICO 9 was at 850 with 9 inquiries. This seems to suggest that inquires are either not being counted by FICO 9 or that there is a larger buffer above 850 in FICO 9. 

My inquiries on Experian have now decreased from 9 to 4 and my industry enhanced scores have not changed. My inquires on Equifax have decreased from 3 to 1 and my FICO 9 industry enhanced scores have increased with each aging off of an inquiry. This seems to suggest that FICO 9 industry enhanced scores only count 3 inquiries. 

So the question is, do FICO 9 Classic scores ignore inquiries or is the buffer area above 850 large enough for 3 inquires. Since my FICO 9 Classic scores are 850, I don't have enough data points to make this determination.

Equifax FICO Model	2/18/2016	6/9/2016	6/10/2016
# Cards Reporting Balances	2 of 36	2 of 30	1 of 30
# Inquiries	3	2	1
AAoA	9Y 9M	10Y 1M	10Y 1M
Aggregate Utilization	< 1%	< 1%	< 1%
Highest CC Utilization	<1%	9.50%	<1%
EQ FICO 04	780	803	814
Auto Enhanced 04	800	822	832
Bankcard Enhanced 04	777	798	808
EQ FICO 08	839	846	850
Auto Enhanced 08	842	849	856
Bankcard Enhanced 08	864	871	878
EQ FICO 9	850	850	850
Auto Enhanced 9	877	886	892
Bankcard Enhanced 9	877	884	888

[RonM21]

Nice score of course! I haven't seen a lot of hard data on Fico9 yet, at least from a consumer perspective. This is a nice chart you have to compare everything.

[EW800]

Outstanding.  Congratulations!  

[Thomas_Thumb]

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@oilcan12 wrote:

 An inquiry aged off of my Equifax report today and my EQ 08 FICO score rose from 846 to 850. I still have 1 inquiry in the last year.

My EQ FICO 9 was already at 850 with 3 inquiries. My Experian FICO 9 was at 850 with 9 inquiries. This seems to suggest that inquires are either not being counted by FICO 9 or that there is a larger buffer above 850 in FICO 9. 

My inquiries on Experian have now decreased from 9 to 4 and my industry enhanced scores have not changed. My inquires on Equifax have decreased from 3 to 1 and my FICO 9 industry enhanced scores have increased with each aging off of an inquiry. This seems to suggest that FICO 9 industry enhanced scores only count 3 inquiries. 

So the question is, do FICO 9 Classic scores ignore inquiries or is the buffer area above 850 large enough for 3 inquires. Since my FICO 9 Classic scores are 850, I don't have enough data points to make this determination.

Equifax FICO Model	2/18/2016	6/9/2016	6/10/2016	3/25/2016	Date TBD
				TT
# Cards Reporting Balances	2 of 36	2 of 30	1 of 30	3 of 6
# Inquiries	3	2	1	0
AAoA	9Y 9M	10Y 1M	10Y 1M	16Y 8M
Aggregate Utilization	< 1%	< 1%	< 1%	2.2%
Highest CC Utilization	<1%	9.5%	<1%	5.1%
EQ FICO 04	780	803	814	809
Auto Enhanced 04	800	822	832	827
Bankcard Enhanced 04	777	798	808	826
EQ FICO 08	839	846	850	850
Auto Enhanced 08	842	849	856	882
Bankcard Enhanced 08	864	871	878	882
EQ FICO 9	850	850	850	850
Auto Enhanced 9	877	886	892	885
Bankcard Enhanced 9	877	884	888	877

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Oilcan12, thanks for the data. I added a column with my data for comparison.

A few points regarding Fico 08 first:

I believe inquiries can be binned, not just discrete counts. Data suggests a bin for Classic Fico 08 (possibly Classic 09 as well) that may include 0 and 1. Enhanced model are tweaked and treatment of # cards reporting and inquiries are likely adjusted by the tweaking.

The bin (0 and 1) is NOT true for EQ Fico 04 or Enhanced EQ Fico 08 for me score changed with INQ CT 0 => 1 => 0 

 - Classic EQ Fico 04: 1 INQ => 0 INQ; 796 => 809 (13 point change for me)

 - Bankcard  EQ Fico 08: 0 INQ => 1 INQ => 0 INQ; 882 => 874 => 882 (8 point change for me)

1) It is possible to have an 850 score with 1 inquiry. My score never dropped from 850 the 2 times a lone HP was on my EQ report. Your 6/10/2016 data shows this as well.

2) It is possible to have very high utilization on a credit card and maintain a Classic Fico 08 score of 850. Example shown beloW:

 * Date 3/2014

 * Cards reporting balances = 5 of 6

 * Highest card utilization = 75.3% (Best Buy card)

 * Overall utilization = 7.6% (including AMEX)

 * TU Fico 08 = 850 (reported through Discover card)

 * Inquiries on TU report = 0

3) Able to maintain Classic Fico 08 850 with 6 of 6 cards reporting. Enhanced Fico 08 scoring models more sensitive to # cards reporting.

4) Able to reach Bankcard Fico 08 900 on TU and EX with 2 of 6 cards reporting. Can't maintain with 3 of 6 reporting. EQ behaves differently [2 of 6 => 886, (3, 4 and 5) of 6 => 882]. Score shift when # cards goes from 2 of 6 (33%) to 3 of 6 (50%).

Regarding Classic Fico 09, it strongly appears potential impact of inquiries is being muted by a "buffer". Clearly, all your enhanced Fico scores show an influence relative to inquiry count as do your Classic EQ Fico 04 and Classic EQ Fico 08 scores. Based on your latest data set, enhanced Fico 08 and Fico 09 scores ARE being influenced by the drop in inquiries.

Not sure how much card count comes into play on your scores (going from 2 to 1). However, I continue to think card count, not just % cards reporting is considered. If so, your 30 cards can't completely insulate your scores [particularly the enhanced Ficos and Classic Fico 04].

[JLK93]

Thomas_Thumb,

Thank you for all of your valuable data. The differences in the enhanced scores are very interesting. 

Card count under 6 cards reporting balances doesn't affect my 08 scores. In the 2 years that I've been monitoring 08, my scores seem to consistently drop at 6 cards with balances as long as utilization is not a factor.

As far as card count affecting 04 scores, it is important to realize that there is drastically different treatment of card count and per card utilization for different 04 buckets. Most of the time on EQ 04 I have been in a bucket where scores are very sensitive to card count and utilization. In this bucket each increase in card count causes a significant drop in score. A few months ago my EQ 04 dropped all the way down to around 758 due to about 6 or 7 cards reporting balances. The last couple of months I have been in a very stable bucket on EQ 04. 6 cards reporting balances with one card at almost 20% didn't even change my 04 score by 1 point. The most dramatic example of this bucket that I have ever seen was when one person claimed to have gone up to 24 cards with balances before his score changed. That's just 2 examples on different treatment for card count under 04 for clean reports. I have heard of other EQ 04 card count treatments for clean accounts although I can't confirm. On TU 04 I am experiencing a card count treatment that is different than either of the examples I have just related.

I find it surprising when you say that data suggests that there is a 0 to 1 inquiry bin. An 850 score with 1 inquiry is not an example of this bin. You've already explained the reason why in the past. I have several examples of 1 inquiry being scored and 0 examples of a bin. For example, I took 1 HP on TU from BofA on Oct 23rd. After the 30 day buffer my TU 08 score dropped from 849 to 846. A couple of weeks later, when the inquiry was removed my TU 08 score went back to 849. This seems like a pretty strong data point. I have other examples.

I've spent a lot of time recently looking through a couple of years of data trying to find any examples of inquiry bins. I can't find anything. There are times when data is inconclusive for various reasons. Even if I gave the benefit of the doubt to inquiry bins for every inconclusive data point, I would still have 0 distinct data points to support the existence of inquiry bins. Yet, I have numerous examples of disccrete count of inquiries in FICO 08 scoring.

For example, my TU 08 point loss due to inquiries seems to top out at 16 points for 4 inquiries. Anything above that doesn't seem to count. I have seen distinct examples of scoring for every inquiry from 0 to 4. 

It could certainly be possible for inquiries to be binned for certain profiles or score cards, although I wouldn't expect that to be the case.

In a few weeks, when I've had time to examine my data more thoroughly, I'll send you a PM with the results. As of now, I'm just not seeing it.

Once again, thanks for all of your data.

[Revelate]

Just data for inquiries on different models since the topic went in that direction; difference between the two EQ pulls being a mortgage inquiry coming out from grace period.  Files were fixed since I was going through HELOC app; was no score shift in the preceeding month.  FICO 9 and FICO 8 shifted, FICO 5 models did not.

EQ Score	6/1/16	6/4/16
FICO 8	714	713
FICO 8 AU	729	721
FICO 8 BC	719	718
FICO 5	693	693
FICO 5 AU	690	690
FICO 5 BC	711	711
FICO 9	786	775
FICO 9 AU	789	779
FICO 9 BC	777	767

Adding EX as well; inquiry just landed from the FU so checked for giggles.  Differences between the two pulls: 2/13 balances to 5/13 balances (did not impact FICO 8 as last alert had all 5 recognized) and +2 inquiries; unfortunately I didn't get an isolated datapoint here post mortgage refinance inquiry coming out of grace period on EX; similar score shifts as on EQ, small change FICO 8, larger change FICO 9, nothing FICO 98, and the one FICO 04 datapoint at +1 is a /shrug somewhere but admittedly not hugely conclusive as a result.

EX Score	5/1/16	6/12/16
FICO 8	724	721
FICO 8 AU	722	720
FICO 8 BC	740	741
FICO 98	723	723
FICO 98 AU	735	735
FICO 98 AU	722	722
FICO 04	678	677
FICO 9	745	722
FICO 9 AU	756	735
FICO 9 BC	740	720

 I will have the bulk of my inquiries coming off in the next two months, may pick a bureau and see if I can isolate the changes.