Credit score is stuck

BumbleB81

Thank you for your responses. I can see I have placed too much importance on the score, although I now wonder what the point of it Is? The reason I felt it necessary to improve the score is because I will be applying for a student account later in the year and considered my score to be important, to gaining a good account.
Also thank you SnowTiger, your reply was helpful. However my credit card provider have written to me advising that they are increasing my available credit and I have had the account for more than 4 months. I thought the impending increase would result in my score rising, so was surprised that it remained the same for a fourth month.

PixelPound

@BumblwB81 The point of the score - it's a marketing ploy, it increases sales of the services CRA's sell to consumers because people naturally want their "score" to be the best it can. If it was just the report (status of your accounts, on electoral roll etc) it would be less appealing to unsuspecting consumers, and you wouldn't suscribe - saying "your mortgage balance has gone down, you've spent more on a CC and applied for a new CC" isn't likely to get consumers willing to part with cash to find out, but "your score has gone down 50 points" or "your score is 450 and the average for your area is 650, see how we can help improve it for you" might.

mwarby

BumbleB81 wrote: »

Hi,

I'm new to this and would appreciate any advice... after completing payments on a debt management plan I have been trying to re-build my credit score. I have a credit card, which I use every month and pay off in full each month. My score was steadily increasing, however it has been stuck for the past 4 months. Does anyone know why this might be and have any suggestions for how I could boost It?
The only thing I can think of is that my credit card company are going to increase my limit, I haven't asked for this, I guess they've reviewed my spending/payments and decided I'm demonstrating that I can manage my spending, but I thought this would result in a rise on my score? I've not applied for any new credit, don't have any large debts and make all my payments on time.

Thanks in advance

from a score point of view(which as other have said need to be taken with a large pinch of salt) what I think is happening is this - you've been able to build up some positive history but the negative history is still showing. The negative info like defaults and arrangements to pay are scored more harshly than any positive history. Its quite likely your score is now as high or close to, as high as it will get before the negative info falls off after 6 years

MEM62

BumbleB81 wrote: »

I now wonder what the point of it Is?

It is to fool you into signing up for the CRA's subscription services. And it works!

BumbleB81

Thanks all, I feel I understand it better now and will continue on my merry way making efforts to keep my finances in good health!

john2054

It feels nice to have a good credit score. But it feels nicer to have lots of credit cards with lots of credit, which are reviewed and increased regularly (assuming you use them quite often). Which is where i am presently at.

I think the main thing the banks want to know, is that you are not going to max all of your cards out, and then never repay them, thus cost them money,

I hope this has been of some help?

Let me know if there is any other advice you want?:j

StopIt

You can have my credit score if you want.


I do warn you, despite nothing really changing credit history this year, it has fluctuated between "Average" and "Excellent" according to ClearScore in the last 6 months.


How it can wildly swing like it does is beyond me and likely most people here. You can be a bankrupt with a high score, in debt to your eyes with a high score, and be rated poorly despite having a well managed credit history. It's a dark art, and companies like Experian have played on the human longing to constantly be graded or scored to justify charging £15pm for them to basically hit an RNG.


As you said, focus on keeping your financial health good, forget about what score pings at you every month.

Crystal_Pixie

It will be interesting to see how those negative factors influence the scoring model.


I have four defaults that all come off this year. At the moment I still have a "very poor" score, even though I have opened 3 credit cards in the past couple of years to improve my credit history.


Once these come off, I will be assuming that my present financial conduct will bring the score up significantly.


If you manage your credit and try and get yourself a credit building card to assist with this you should find things improving.


I will keep the forum updated on how defaults factor into Credit Experts "score".