Questions about what is really impacting my credit rating

moneysaver7976

I recently enquired about a mortgage with HSBC as I am now in a position where I can afford the repayments, I have a very good deposit and have no debts to speak of however during the application my request was denied during the credit check and I was informed to go check my credit file.

I checked on Experian on there I have a score of 979, however with one negative comment saying “The number of credit accounts you are using is high” this is a fair comment as I do have four credit cards and a combined total limit of £22k

I checked Check my file and both Call Credit and Equifax rate my credit rating at 709 with a public rating of 903

Where I am confused is that Call Credit and Equifax mark me down as having an “Arrangement to pay listed” on my credit file (I personally believe this is wrong as it is listed in the opening month of a brand new HSBC credit card, which had a zero usage in that first month) however Experian do not appear to make a big deal of the Arrangement to pay in fact it was quite hard to find! and seem to mark me down as having too many and maybe too much available credit (£22k) even if all of it is at zero balance.

Can anyone guide me and let me know which one of these is really the reason HSBC just totally refused to go any further with the application? and what path I should go down to get myself a good credit rating.

Any help really appreciated!

Paul

The_Boss

You don't have a credit rating or a credit score, so ignore those pointless made up numbers as they would not have played any part at all in the decision whether to lend to you or not. This is not what HSBC would have meant by checking your file - just the data on it.

An arrangement to pay showing on your file would scupper your application. Have you seen which file HSBC searched? If not, check out the searches part of your report. When you say the arrangement to pay was difficult to find on Experian what do you mean by that?

Lenders wouldn't be that fussed about available credit if none of it is being used (in theory they could ask you to close a card or two first). What is your salary, what was your deposit and how much was the property valued at?

thebritishbloke

Looks like there could be an administrative error with HSBC in regards to the arrangement to pay marker, might be worth contacting them directly about it.

moneysaver7976

I have been into the branch today and have had an initial chat with an advisor. She has asked me to bring in the print outs of the credit checks on monday and we are going to call the credit card department together to see if we can get to the bottom of the "arrangement to pay" I have no objection to showing them the details of my credit file as apart from this one Arrangement to pay it is totally clean and I have nothing to hide.

When I say the arrangement to pay was difficult to find on the Experian website I mean it was not flagged up on the report in red and it took me a while to find it. Where as on the Check my file website it is listed immediately as soon as you log into the webpage in red.

The property I am looking at is around £200k I was working on an deposit of £50k and taking £150k as a mortgage. I earn around £60k but I could increase the deposit to around the £80k mark maybe more if i liquidated a few assets.

Thrugelmir

Why do need 4 credit cards? (Asked rhetorically).

moneysaver7976

Clearly I do not need four ........I just never got around to cancelling some of them and up till now i didn't think anything of it.

moneysaver7976

Well after a very productive meeting at the local branch I have now received a letter confirming that the arrangement to pay marker was applied in error and has now been removed. Hopefully now it is just a matter of waiting for the credit agency databases to refresh?

Nasqueron

Probably be a month or two depending how quick they did it and when the CRA updates their records each month. Close a couple of useless cards at the same time.

I'd put a complaint in about the error given it stopped the mortgage and you'll probably get £50 or £100 as an apology

The_Boss

Nasqueron wrote: »

n it stopped the mortgage and you'll probably get £50 or £100 as an apology

When you think about it though, that is small fry considering it has sabotaged a mortgage enquiry.

The_Boss

moneysaver7976 wrote: »

Well after a very productive meeting at the local branch I have now received a letter confirming that the arrangement to pay marker was applied in error and has now been removed. Hopefully now it is just a matter of waiting for the credit agency databases to refresh?

Keep the letter and get copies of it - there's a chance Experian and Equifax will be useless and not remove it, but having the letter as proof means you can prove it if they refuse for any reason (which would largely be incompetence).

Thrugelmir

Nasqueron wrote: »

I'd put a complaint in about the error given it stopped the mortgage and you'll probably get £50 or £100 as an apology

There's no evidence as to the why application was declined. The response was most likely a standard reply to the question asked. As the person asked would have no idea as to the detail.