question for SW users

[gheedorah]

How often does the FICO score actually update with this product?

Will it refresh any time there is any change to my FICO score, or will it simply tell me that my score has changed, but not tell me what the new score is?

Is the update scheduled, or any time there's a change?

Is there a means to manually refresh it?

Thanks all!

[gheedorah]

Actually, reading all these complaints/issues with it, maybe I will just hold off.

They should have a feature where you can just pay 5 bucks a pop for your FICO score only.

Oh well.

[llecs]

Definitely read the Score Watch Guide . It's a wealth of info on how SW works and what it does and what it does not do.

Your FICO can update daily with SW, if you have certain triggers that cause it to update daily like a score impact when balances increase, score impact when inquiries are added, score impact when account stati change, etc. These are called credit alerts and whenever you get a credit alert -AND- your FICO score changes then SW will let you know of your score change. Conversely, if you have a credit alert and your FICO did not change, then you won't get a new FICO score notification because the score didn't change. I just got one this morning (balance increase on my CC) and the change wasn't enough to cause my FICO to change. Likewise, if you are coasting down towards the credit sunset and nothing is happening on your credit reports you could go months without any sort of score or credit alert.

Absent credit alerts, there are also score alerts. Absent changes, SW will automatically check your EQ FICO for changes every 7-10 days or so. I've received score alerts inside that time quite a few times, but they advertise 7-10. Score alerts are only based off your set target score. If your new EQ FICO hits or exceeds your set target score then you'll get alerted within 7-10 days of that change. It's very, very important to EXACTLY set your target score to EXACTLY match your current EQ FICO. That way if your score increases or decreases it moves past the target score and you'll get alerted. After each alert or notification of a score change you need to immediately reset your target score. If you fail to do so, you won't get any alerts until your new score moves past that target again. Many in here (me too when I first subscribed) fail to correctly set their target score in a timely manner and miss out of score alerts.

The only way to manually refresh it is to buy a new EQ FICO report. SW gives you two with your subscription with the first being used when you first subscribe. Future reports beyond the other one are 30% off.

[gheedorah]

Wow.

Thanks for the link, which answered everything, and thanks for you response, which clarified some of the information from the link!

Much appreciated!

[llecs]

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@gheedorah wrote:

They should have a feature where you can just pay 5 bucks a pop for your FICO score only.

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Great idea. I'd buy it. Maybe toss in there the top two negative scoring reasons like folks find on their Wal-Mart, Merrick, or M&T statements.

[gheedorah]

Good idea re: top 2 negatives, or throwing in some other morsels of pertinent info.

I'm surprised that with the market that exists for credit rebuilding, credit obsessing, credit-checking-before-whatever-action, etc, that they don't have more packages, or build-your-own packages. There's money to be made, people!

[llecs]

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@gheedorah wrote:

Good idea re: top 2 negatives, or throwing in some other morsels of pertinent info.

I'm surprised that with the market that exists for credit rebuilding, credit obsessing, credit-checking-before-whatever-action, etc, that they don't have more packages, or build-your-own packages. There's money to be made, people!

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Speaking as an outsider, I think myFICO's hands are mostly tied. I think it's the CRAs that are preventing them from expanding their product base, and maybe a little FICO leadership too. But I know that myFICO has to have an agreement with the CRAs in order to provide any scores in here.

I've advocated for a very long time that myFICO needs to offer more scores. Most lenders use the Beacon 5.0 as found on myFICO, but I would be open to buying every once and a while industry-specific scores like a CC-enhanced FICO, an auto-enhanced FICO, etc. Likewise, if myFICO offered the rarely used FICO08 version for EQ (Beacon 9.0), then I'd buy it too. Likewise for TU, if they offered stand-alone purchases for our TU FICO aside from the TU98 offered I'd buy it, especially TU04, TU08, and the industry-specific scores.

I heard a complaint that it might be confusing for consumers to see all of these scores, but most of the consumers within these forums know very well that there are more than three FICOs available from each of the 3 CRAs. I think if it was made available there would be more purchased.