tips for improving my credit score Please

silveraura

Hi all,

I'm new to the site but i'm sure i'm in the right place after reading many of your posts. I would love tips on how to improve my credit score. At the moment its rated as poor on the experian site, All my payments are marked as satistactory (ie. i'm paying them off on time) i did have a phase where i missed 4 payments but that was ages ago and 5 years ago i defaulted on a credit aggreement but this has since been settled and is marked as satisfactory, I had a small mortgage that i paid off in full a few weeks ago but it still shows on the site, and i have no credit cards at all just a few club books and the debt is under £900! the site also says i'm only using 13% of my available credit so i'm at a loss as to what i'm supposed to do do improve it

thanks in advance for all your wonderful advice

Lorri x

OliveOyl_2

Hi silveraura,

your credit rating is based on a number of things.

Lenders are looking to see how you can deal with credit, if you don't have much credit (no credit cards) then they cannot see that you are a good credit risk! One way of improving that is to get a credit card and use it to benefit you. Buy your groceries on it each month, and then pay it off in full so that you don't incur any interest. If you can get a cashback card, then you will have them paying you to use it (not a great deal, but every little helps)

A quick fix for your rating is to ensure that you are on the electoral roll. Some lenders won't look at lending to you if that isn't the case.

And it takes time to alter a credit rating, so your mortgage may not be updated for a while.

Hope this helps a bit.

silveraura

thanks Olive,

I am on the electoral role and i'll see about getting a credit card but as i'm rated poor i dont see how i will get one lol

I'll try

Lorri x

~Beanie~

If you are only using 13% of your available credit, where is the other 87%? Is it accounts / cards that you no longer use, if so, close them. You could be getting turned down for credit as lenders may think that you don;t actually need it with so much available to you already!