I thought I would share this with the rest of you and hopefully get some insight. So I paid down a bunch of balances this month that were very high around 90%, before applying for credit cards, because the utilization was seriously bogging down my scores. After doing so, my myFico scores went up, balances updated along with all other types of scores shortly after I received an alert that my balances were paid down.
A couple of days later I applied to some new cards. To my surprise, I learned 2 things.
First, I was denied by some cards that checked my Experian score which was my lowest of the three. I decided to pay the $1 and sign up for Experian's membership to get my REAL Fico and report directly from Experian since they now sell their real Fico, or at least one of them.
The score was not just different! I noticed that Experian had not yet updated my balances even though they were updated on myFico.com's Experian alert report! Experian score had not budged like myFico claimed it has. What the heck? It turns out that Experian themselves do a balance update ONLY on the 1st of every month on every account listed with them, regardless of when they get the information from the credit card companies or due date. MyFico.com alerts me immediately and recalculated the score shortly after. Obviously if Experian updates on the 1st, anyone that checked my score, was still getting my old score, even though myFico is telling me my Experian Fico has updated. WRONG!
Second, was my Equifax score. It shot up from roughly a 695 to a 745 on myFico.com. My Bankcard 8 scores also shot up. When I received an email from PenFed, they told me my score was a 655! I was approved but my rate wasn't what I expected with someone with a 700+ score across all the different scores and their email clarified that one. They didn't say which model they used exactly, just the scale, 150-950. Even if we want to believe it was due to a different model, on a 950 scale it shouldn't be so low as a 655. Pretty shocked as you can imagine.
Obviously this sucks if you are trying to apply shortly after paying down your cards and you are using myFIco.com as guidance. I really don't want to spend ANOTHER $20 to get the real FICO from Equifax.com(not their FAKO), but something tells me if I pull it, I'm going to see what I saw with Experian. That Equifax hasn't updated my score yet, even though myFico says it has.
So what's the deal? Is myFICO really getting the scores from the credit bureaus themselves, or are they simply applying the Fico scoring model to the information on the credit report? Obviously it's a pretty big deal between a 655 and a 745! Something tells me if I would have waited until the 1st of next month, I would have gotten a much better rate. I paid $25 for the subscription, and it turns out it's inccorect. I'm pretty sure the banks don't get your FICO from myFICO.com, and if it is true that the rest of the bureaus only update on the 1st, like Experian, then myFICO.com is very misleading!
