Why did my FICO score drop 38 points?

Anonymous · ‎03-03-2015

The subject says it all. I'm wondering how and why did my FICO score drop 38 points within a couple of weeks?

I've had a 800+ FICO score for most of my life. About a year ago it crept up to 814. The past couple of months it crept up to 832.

The last time I checked it was 832 and then a couple weeks later, today, I checked and it dropped to 794 !!!

I don't understand what happened. Nothing out of the ordinary was done. I always pay my credit card bills on time, in one shot. I have no outstanding or revolving debt.

The only thing slightly unusual this month was I used one of my credit cards alot. The available credit limit on the card is $6,000 and I charged about $2,700 this month. But on the due date, as I always do, I paid full.

There is nothing else that is out of the ordinary.

What's going on and how can I find out what happened?

Thanks.

Anonymous · ‎03-03-2015

@Anonymous wrote:
The subject says it all. I'm wondering how and why did my FICO score drop 38 points within a couple of weeks?

I've had a 800+ FICO score for most of my life. About a year ago it crept up to 814. The past couple of months it crept up to 832.

The last time I checked it was 832 and then a couple weeks later, today, I checked and it dropped to 794 !!!

I don't understand what happened. Nothing out of the ordinary was done. I always pay my credit card bills on time, in one shot. I have no outstanding or revolving debt.

The only thing slightly unusual this month was I used one of my credit cards alot. The available credit limit on the card is $6,000 and I charged about $2,700 this month. But on the due date, as I always do, I paid full.

There is nothing else that is out of the ordinary.

What's going on and how can I find out what happened?

Thanks.

Welcome to the forums

Your score more than likely dropped because while you paid the large balance off before your due date your card reported to the credit bureaus the larger than normal balance. Most often your credit card company will report whatever balance is showing at the of your statement and not what is reporting on yor due date. This caused a temporary ride in your utilization which play an important part of credit scoring.

You have two options there, either pay the balance in full before the statement cuts or understand that while your score dropped, it's a temporary drop and the score will go back up next month when your card reports a lower balance. Utilization has no memory and will adjust back up.

takeshi74 · ‎03-04-2015

@Anonymous wrote:
The only thing slightly unusual this month was I used one of my credit cards alot. The available credit limit on the card is $6,000 and I charged about $2,700 this month. But on the due date, as I always do, I paid full.

Most cards report on statement date so even if you pay in full on the due date the balance had already reported. Utilization falls under Amount Owed below:

http://www.myfico.com/crediteducation/whatsinyourscore.aspx

$2,700/6,000 is just under 50% which is quite high.

The way to find out what caused a score changes to carefully review report from before and after the change.