can your fico score go down from car rental company freezing money on credit card?

[johnpalley]

can your fico score go down from car rental company freezing money on credit card? my credit score went down 7 points all of the sudden for no reason that i can think of other than enterprise rent a car freezing 700 dollars from my 1200 dollar limit credit card because i rented a car. is it possible to go down because of that?

[Anonymous]

Maybe, if it happened right before your credit card company reported to the bureaus. $700 out of $1200 equals 58% utilization, of course the utilization would be more if you already had a balance on the card. I'm not 100% sure though, but it would make sense to me.

[johnpalley]

so if a company freezes money on my card it counts toward the utilization? your sure about that right? because if that is true than im sure thats why the score went down

[missdesire]

I think the only way your score can goes down is if you used you debit card with the Visa and MC logo. I know Dollar and Thrifty will run your credit if you use your bank card with them. I have learned my lesson with them. I don't think  your credit should drop if you are using a major CC to rent a car.

[johnpalley]

guys i need a definite answer to this. does anybody know for sure?

[MidnightVoice]

I don't know "for sure" but when a hotel or car rental company has taken a "deposit" from my card it shows up online as a "pending transaction", and my availble credit goes down that amount.

However, the CRA should not know anything until the CCC posts the balance to the CRA, which should be the statement balance.

[johnpalley]

ok so that has to be the reason it went down. im going to enterprise to put a cash deposit instead and im going to tell them to unfreeze all of my credit cards.

[Anonymous]

I found out from my sister trying to rent a car that you have to ask each individual car rental company what is their individual policy.  Each location has different policies.  Some car rental companys pull a hard pull (credit check) if you use a debit card.  So this would be a reason for the drop in scoring.

Some only take a major card only, and some do take cash with certain stipulations.

You have to ask each company for the 'what ifs'.

[Tavares]

johnpalley,

I have dealt with all major rental car companies, using my AmEx, BoA and CHASE cards. Temporary Authorizations on the Credit Cards are not reported as part of your ballance to the Credit Bureaus.

I even went as far as testinting and monitoring it purposedly just to see.  There might be other factors effecting your score.

Good Luck,

Joao

Message Edited by Tavares on 09-10-2007 11:07 PM