Question about hard vs. soft inquiries

[Anonymous]

     Please forgive me if this an elementary question- I recently paid in full all my cards from proceeds of a mortgage on my home, and as thanks B of A slashed my credit line and put on it's "punishment rate". They said it was due to my Transunion report showing too many accounts, too high balances. I had completed payment if FULL of my accounts a week or 2 prior to this happening, but oviously T-U couldn't be bothered to be accurate or current.

     As a result, they sent me contact info for T-U to get a free copy of my report. If I call or write to get this copy of my report, will it be currrent as of TODAY, or will it be the one B of A used to stick it to me? Not that IT was current, either!

     Also, will taking such action be considered a "hard pull", "soft pull" or neither?

                                         Thanks!- Vic

[Anonymous]

Vic, pulling your own credit reports is considered a 'soft pull'. It has absolutely no effect on your credit scores. In fact, no one sees them but you(and perhaps some creditor that does a soft pull on you also).

I've heard this story before....a ccc raising the interest rate, decreasing the cl, or closing altogether a cc because they say "you have to many accounts".

Closing because of high balances is another story. What are your utilizations?

[Anonymous]

     Thank you for your response & patience. My balances and utilization had been pretty high, the result of several years of reduced self-employment income while caring for my elderly parents before they passed away. I had to make the choices my soul could live with under the circumstances I was dealt. I also have ZERO late payments for over 25 years. At the time B of A sh*t-nuked me, I had ALREADY paid off total balances in the very high 5 figure range, including them! This was done with the proceeds of a mortgage on the old family home I inherited (plus buying out my 2 brothers shares). Getting this done as a self-employed person in today's market, I, all kidding aside, seriously consider to be a case of Divine Intervention! The only balance I didn't pay off was about $4K on my Lowes Building Materials card, because it has a promo rate of 0% until November 2008. My current utilization is about 7% because of that.

     Thanks again for your response and info. Any other info or comments are appreciated.

                                             Best Wishes- Vic

[haulingthescoreup]

I don't know if BofA really did this because of what was on your TU report, or if they got mad because you're no longer carrying balances and used this as an excuse. But one thing that you can do to force TU to get a move on is to dispute the balances on all the accounts that you paid down or off, that they haven't bothered to update. You'll need to wait for the mailed report that you can get for free, or you can go online and pay $10 or so for a full report (don't buy a score, or monitoring, or any other junk they want to sell; just "single report"), follow the dispute option, and dispute the balances online.

The question is what BofA's real agenda is, so it might not do you a bit of good, but at least it will force TU to do its job. I'm sorry to hear BofA did this to you. I remember when you originally posted about choosing to take care of your folks, and I admired you then for doing this, and I still do. Good luck.

[l-bug]

Seems like B of A is giving several people the shaft!

http://articles.moneycentral.msn.com/Banking/CreditCardSmarts/IsBankofAmericaBlindsidingCardholders....

[tryingtogetitrightnow]

perhaps you could write B of A a letter of reconsideration or something? If they see your utilization is so low now, then it would see to make sense for them to re-up your CL and reverse the rate hike they gave you, especially if your balance is paid off and they think you won't charge up their line because of the rate hike, which translates into lost revenue for them.

Good luck!

[RobertEG]

I agree that it should be a soft pull, but would not just blindly assume that it will be a soft pull.  I agree that it is basically a pull requested by the consumer,and not the creditor, but the pull you are requesting is a hybrid kinda pull, stemming from a request for new credtit (normally a hard pull), but then actually requested by the consumer (a soft pull).  So I could easily see how some pencil pusher in data entry might incorrectly code it such that it may fall into a code that will show as a hard pull.  Monitor it, and challenge it if it is.  It is a coding issue. 

CRAs do NOT use only two categories, ie, hard and soft, and do not code them that way.  They have eight with different codes for pulls of your credit, and  All pulls are coded.  What we call hard and soft pulls are the result of someone culling our file, and determining whether the code on each pull is going to be included in the scoring algorithm when the CRA calculates your credit score.   Those that the algorithm will include are commonly referred to as hard, and all others soft.  None are coded as "nothing"  or are ignored. If you gain access to your full credit report, and not just the vanilla version that you get through the commercial sites, such as myFico and others, you will see that each and every pull, even including those you make when reviewing our own report, and those pulls made by those seeking to offer pre-screened marketing credit offers, are included. 

If you doubt this, order your report through annualcreditreport.com, which is the site that gives you your free, once yearly credit report from each of the three CRAs.  On there, you will see each and every credit pull made, and the code for each.  You will be amazed.    When you order your vanilla report through the commercial sites, such as myFico and others, you dont see your whole file.  They cull out those inquiries that they dont use when calculating your credit score.  Only what we call hard  pulls are shown.

I have never personally ordered the requried "free" credit report under the FCRA that must be provided after a specific credit request is denied, so do not know if they are ever coded such they result in a hard pull.  but be aware that with eight coding categories, it could easily happen.   Just check your report, and if it does show up as a hard pull, challenge it.  It should not be.

Message Edited by RobertEG on 02-09-2008 11:32 AM

Message Edited by RobertEG on 02-09-2008 11:34 AM

Message Edited by RobertEG on 02-09-2008 11:48 AM

Message Edited by RobertEG on 02-09-2008 11:50 AM

[Anonymous]

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RobertEG wrote:

I agree that it should be a soft pull, but would not just blindly assume that it will be a soft pull.  I agree that it is basically a pull requested by the consumer,and not the creditor, but the pull you are requesting is a hybrid kinda pull, stemming from a request for new credtit (normally a hard pull), but then actually requested by the consumer (a soft pull).  So I could easily see how some pencil pusher in data entry might incorrectly code it as a hard pull.  Monitor it, and challenge it if it is.  It is a coding issue. 

All pulls are coded,and there are eight different codes used.  Some are hard, and some are soft. But none are coded as "nothing"  or are ignored. If you gain access to your full credit report, and not just the vanilla version that you get through the commercial sites, such as myFico and others, you will see that each and every pull, including your own pulls when reviewing your own report, are ALL listed.

If you doubt this, order your report through annualcreditreport.com, which is the site that gives you your free, once yearly credit report from each of the three CRAs.  On there, you will see each and every credit pull made and coded, including all that you make in reviewing your own report, and those made by others in offering pre-screened credit offers.  You will be amazed.  They will also list the exact code for each pull type.  Only the hard pulls are culled and shown on your myFico report,but that is not all that is kept and recorded by the CRAs in your files.

I have never personally ordered the requried "free" credit report under the FCRA that must be provided if credit is denied based upon info in your report, so do not know if they are ever scored as hard pulls.  Just check your report, and if it does show up as a hard pull, challenge it.  It should not be.

Message Edited by RobertEG on 02-09-2008 11:32 AM

Message Edited by RobertEG on 02-09-2008 11:34 AM

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Pulling one's own report is always a soft pull.  There is no gray area.

[RobertEG]

I agree cheddar!!  Totally!!  It is not used in your credit scoring!!!  LOL!! 

And they are so common that they are fully automated in their coding, so we dont even see them in our sanitized credit reports.  But that is not my point. 

My caution was simple.  CRAs do NOT code inquiries as "soft" or "hard."  They code them as to specfic type. With they type of inquiry invollved, it might easily be miscoded.  MyFico is a consumer subsidiary of FairIsaac, and provides a consumer product.  They dont want to post to us a credit reprot that shows pages of inquires that are not even used in calculating our credit score, but it does not mean that the consumer reprot that we get is the ful report, beecause it is not.

As an example of what myFico does not provide, but is listed when you get your free EQ report from annualcreditreport.com, is the prefix explaining the specific type of each individual inquiry.   Only "hard" inquiries are provided by myFico, but the free report give you all inquiries, and their specific type.

There are seven other types of inquiries.  He are the exact definitions as provided on the EQ credit report obtained thru annualcreditreport.com:

PRM:   Inquiries with this prefix indicate that only your name and address were given to a credit grantor so they can provide you a firm offer of credit or insurance.  (PRM inquiries remain for 12 months)

AM or AR:   Inquiries with these prefixes indicate a periodic review of your credit history by one of your creditors.  (AM and AR inquiries remain for 12 months)

EMPL:  Inquiries with this prefix indicate an employment inquiry.  (EMPL inquiries remain for 24 months)

PR:  Inquiries with this prefix indicate that a creditor reviewed you account as part of a portfolio they are purchasing.  (PR inquiries remain for 12 months)

Equifax or EFX:  Inquiries with this prefix indicate Equifax’s activity in response to your contact with them for a copy of your credit file of a research request.

ND:  Inquiries with this prefix are general inquiries that do not display to credit grantors.  (ND inquiries remain for 24 months)

ND MR:  Inquiries with this prefix indicate the reissue of a mortgage credit report containing information from your Equifax credit file to another company in connection with a mortgage loan.  (ND MR inquiries remain for 24 months)

I am not sure that I would have any idea where to code an inquiry required as a result of an inquiry that would assure that it be coded such that it would not show "hard." 

This is not a major issue, just a minor caution.  All inquiries are there, so make sure they dont show in a manner that does not make them what you call "hard" if you think they are "soft," , and if they do, it is not because they should not in fact be there, or dont exist. 

Message Edited by RobertEG on 02-09-2008 12:45 PM

Message Edited by RobertEG on 02-09-2008 12:46 PM

[Anonymous]

I'm aware that the MyFICO reports don't show everything.

I thought you were saying that the CRA might intentionally code the inquiry as a hard pull because it's in connection with an application for credit, hence the supposed "gray area."  I see what you are saying now.