Experian Scoring Errors

[sghosh5]

I have been dilligently paying off most of my cards and paying down my over all balances. My scores all moved up from 580s to 650 - 660 ranges now and i still have balances to pay off. Paid down from alomost 96% utilization to 35% and still more to report. One of the cards on my account is still at 96% utilization. Yesterday when it reported on Experian, my scores dropped 24 points !! Alert said total revolving utlization is 96%. That is so wrong. Only one card is that utilization and it hadn't changed anything this while, so it is not a new information on my credit. While this did not affect anything on Equifax and TU. In fact Equifax score went up 7 points since that card showed i actually reduced balance on it. So demoralizing from Experian

[Anonymous]

Yep, it's demoralizing and it's a fantastic lesson to take to heart permanently: if you use a card for close to the limit, don't be shocked if that gets reported even if it's midcycle.

Look back and ask yourself based on your charge/payment patterns how you could have paid it down early to keep it from every reporting over 28% in the past cycle.  Then do that from now on.

[sghosh5]

The card had always been reporting 99% to 96% all this while i am paying down balances on the others. All this while the score had been going up. Until yesterday when it reported again for April, the score dropped significantly. It is not like the card utilization was below 30% last month. 

[Anonymous]

Does the Experian score actually say "FICO" next to the number?

[sghosh5]

This is what it shows

[sghosh5]

And this is the same account got an alert today which actually shows decrease in balance

[Anonymous]

You're confusing an alert with a score pull.  See my signature link on this exact topic -- your score did not drop because of 96% utilization.  It dropped for another reason entirely.

[Anonymous]

ABCD is exactly right in the above post.

The score change provided with an alert often has nothing to do with the alert you received.  In this case, that's 100% what's going on.  Something else changed and caused your score drop and whatever that was simply wasn't an alertable event.

[sghosh5]

A 24 point drop has to be something significant that reported on credit. And i thought MYFico alerts all credit changes.

[sghosh5]

A 24 point drop has to be something significant that reported on credit. And i thought myfico alerts all credit changes.