Hi everyone, haven't posted much since last December, cleaning up my reports and getting other ducks in line. Finally took the plunge recently, applied for refi. Details and some discoveries and questions about the mortgage system in a separate post in the mortgage forum.
This post is about my experience with credit scoring, reporting to lenders, and the accompanying false negative comments. If it's more than you want to read, please at least see #4 and the Urgent Question at the end!
1. I was able to raise my score, marginally (about 7 points), by *judicious* deletion of closed accounts. These were all opened more recently than the average age of my current accounts, so having them removed did *increase* my AAoA. Some were closed more than 10 years ago, and I was able to have them removed by the regular dispute process. One other was closed more than 7, but less than 10 years ago, and I actually succeeded in getting one CRA to remove it by arguing that it was reducing my AAoA and thus was "derogatory" information that should be deleted after 7 years.
2. I can confirm what others have said about the plus/minus of all-zero CC balances. I did a well-controlled experiment, with the only difference being a residual $10 balance on one card, zero on the others, versus all zero. It's true: EQ penalizes you for this, by 4 points in my case. OTOH, TU gave me 6 points to the plus. Went back to $10-0-0, both went back to the level of two months before.
3. Since my EQ and TU credit scores had been stable at 813 since June 2009 (except for the zero-balance experiment described above), I figured that's what would be reported to prospective lenders I contacted. NOT. All three lenders received essentially identical reports, but the scores were pretty different. Only EQ came through at the score I had bought from them, using a Beacon (or Beacon50) scoring model. TU reported an 823, for both a "Classic04" and an "Empirica" model, 10 points higher that the score they sold me. Then there's EX, always the odd one out it seems. They reported 842 using a model described only as "Fair Isaac". Supposedly it covers a range of 150-950. Assuming the scoring is all linear, that would be equivalent to only 776 from EQ and TU. I realize that's probably a poor assumption, but it's all I have to go on. While it's nice to see the numbers coming through larger than I had expected, the unpredictability of the whole process is disturbing. For example, why won't TU sell me the same score they report to the lenders? It would have been useful to know.
4. But way more disturbing that the score disparities are the totally false, extremely negative statements of "key factors adversely affecting your score" that accompanied them in the credit service reports to the lenders. In all three cases, EQ claimed the "Amount owed on revolving accounts is too high" (code 11). Huh? It's $10! An identical statement was attached to the EX score on one of the three reports. And TU dinged me in each report for an "Insufficient length of credit history" (code 14). Double Huh? It's over 35 years!
Urgent Question: Has anyone else experienced the kind of gratuitous assassination in #4 just above? How seriously does it negate what seem to be pretty good scores otherwise? No such statements ever appeared on the scores I bought from EQ and TU. It isn't even clear to me who is responsible for them, or whom to contact to get them corrected. I sure don't want to take the time for a whole dispute process, thought that was all behind me. Any advice would be much appreciated.
Starting Score: EQ 804 - (April 2009) 
Thanks. This is useful, since I'm not very well informed about the various scoring models, only know that many exist.
But I do know my credit balance, limits, and available very well. From an EQ report at the same time: revolving accounts total balance $10, available $29.990, limit $30,000, all exactly correct. The accompanying EQ "Score Power" said "there are no actionable negative factors present with your score". So it's especially galling that only now, when I actually need a good report to lenders, they stab me in the back with that "amount owed is too high".
Interesting. I have 3 open revolving accounts, only one with a balance. The $30,000 limit is the sum of 20,300 BofA and 9,700 Cap1; AmEx "no fixed limit" counts as zero. There are two closed revolving accounts, a Sears/CBSD closed in good standing 17 months ago, and a BofA account they reported "lost or stolen" even though the card is actually still in my possession (I posted separately about that on the Credit Card forum).
Yes, the "debt to credit ratio" on the EQ report shows 0%. Are you saying they are treating my credit limit as zero and then criticizing me for having the $10 balance? "Highly illogical!" Especially since the only reason I have that $10 balance is because EQ penalized me for having all zero balances. Feh.