@Thomas_Thumb wrote:
@iced wrote:
I PIF every month and have a balance report, so why not just do both?
As an example, on one card I'll run about $3,000 a month through it, spread over the course of the month. Come statement time, I'll have a statement balance of around $3,000 and a balance of about $4,500. I pay the $3,000 statement balance so I don't accrue any interest and continue on my way. By the time the next statement closes, the balance has gone from about $1,500 to $3,000 and I repeat the cycle. I never pay interest and I show a balance at the same time.
That said, I'm not sure having balances report is doing jack for my score since I'm told (via this forum) that FICO ignores utilization on my two primary cards, though I do see a fluctuation of 3-4 points any given month (though this may be due to overall utilizaton rather than utilization on individual cards).
Not sure what your "primary" cards are but, almost all store cards are revolvers as are credit cards. These should factor into revolving utilization [unless you have AU status - then they may or may not count]. Of course, AMEX charge cards (1 month payment term) are not revolvers even if they show in that category on reports.
The amount of balance you allow to report on credit cards relative to credit limits are factors in Fico scoring. As a general rule for best score potential it is advisable to:
1) Keep reported utilization on individual cards under 30%.
2) Keep aggregate utilization (all cards combined) under 9%.
If the CL of the card in the above example is $6000 and you allow $3100 to report, the card utilization is above 50%. This could be costing you some points relative to reporting a $2900 balance (below 50% utilization). Now if you have 4 cards and a total CL of $30k you would want total of statement balances to be less than $2700 (9%) for best scoring result relative to the aggregate utilization factor..
The information I received was that if the CL of the card is $50,000 or higher, FICO ignores its individual utilization and the balance reported only factors toward total utilization. This information, being learned via the interwebs, could be wrong. I imagine that, as you point out, NPSL cards also fall into this bucket. This particular aspect is only applicable to some people, of course.
The statement that you can PIF and still carry a balance is applicable to almost everyone.
