TransUnion extremely volatile credit score

Crystalpalacian1

Hello 

Don't know if other members have the same experience or anybody can offer some advice but my TransUnion credit score changes so often & frequently for no obvious reasons whilst my Equifax score has barely ever changed for over a year now & my Experian has changed very infrequently in the past year. My TU score changes nearly every month even if I barely use any credit, it normally goes up & down by 12 or 8 points but yesterday it went down by 52 points & the reason it gives is that I am either not using my cards or I've applied for credit recently both of which are false & there is nothing on my credit report to support them. Usually, I make sure I use at least £10 on each of my cards every month to stop them being closed down & I have 3 of them, sometimes it's once every 2 months but I use at least one each month & none of them have had a credit limit decrease, rather I've a had a £3k limit increase recently. The only anomaly on my report is one of my cards was in credit for a while after I received a refund which pushed it to about £300 above the limit & unfortunately the company took a while to transfer the money back on my bank account, so I barely used the card in that time (about 2 months) except to pay a monthly subscription of £6.99. I fear TU is going to come up with a reason if I ring them, although there isn't any from my point of view, how can they treat people's personal data so ruthlessly & what are my alternative solutions? 

la531983

The advice is to ignore it. The score is a novelty feature that is only used to sell you credit products. Lenders have no access to it. 

MorningcoffeeIV

Crystalpalacian1 said:

 how can they treat people's personal data so ruthlessly  

In what way is your data being used 'ruthlessly'?

Producing a comedy score once a month isn't ruthless.

Crystalpalacian1

Just for some context here, I am a young person in his mid-30s who's just about to apply for a mortgage for the first time, so whilst some of you might think this is trivial, it is not not to me and comes with a load of anxiety. So please be kind & thoughtful in your responses. Thanks!

la531983

Crystalpalacian1 said:

Just for some context here, I am a young person in his mid-30s who's just about to apply for a mortgage for the first time, so whilst some of you might think this is trivial, it is not not to me and comes with a load of anxiety. So please be kind & thoughtful in your responses. Thanks!

Nothing you have been told is inaccurate. The 3 digit score is meaningless and used for absolutely nothing in terms of making lending decisions in this country. As long as the data held is fine, that's grand.
Nothing is being used "ruthlessly". All that is happening is you are falling into their trap thinking it means something. 

Crystalpalacian1

la531983, I understand but no one likes to think they have been penalised for no obvious reason regardless of how much it means in real terms, it's just human nature but otherwise I note what you're saying. 

sourcrates

Crystalpalacian1 said:

Thank you @la531983, I understand but no one likes to think they have been penalised for no obvious reason regardless of how much it means in real terms, it's just human nature but otherwise I note what you're saying. 

If you look at the bottom of the credit karma website its states -

"Credit Karma UK Limited is a credit broker, not a lender. We get commission if you take out a product, but we're independent so we never rank offers based on that".

The "score" you see, is generated by them, for your eyes only, its used to try and sell you credit cards/loans, access to credit building products etc, if you sign up to one of those, they get commission.

Lenders use their own internal scoring system when considering you for credit, based on the actual data, not the number you see displayed on any of the credit reference agency websites, that is basically just a marketing gimmick, and to be honest, its high time they came clean and told you that.

Crystalpalacian1

sourcrates, I suppose they lower your score unnecessarily then try to sell you these bad credit high interest cards which makes sense in a way, actually last year I applied for a credit card which I was told I had 0% chance of getting and got it online with a £5k limit without any referral. But does TU operate in the same way as Credit Karma, Totally Money etc.? Because after all it is them who give the score. 

sourcrates

The system in the UK is the same no matter the agency.

The number produced as your "credit score" is never seen or used by lenders, they generate their own score, using their own scoring system, but using your data.

In the US, its completely different, the score generated is your actual credit score, why they can`t just do that here I do not know.

CliveOfIndia

sourcrates said:

In the US, its completely different, the score generated is your actual credit score, why they can`t just do that here I do not know.

I suspect it's to do with the variability of criteria between lenders.  There are many common factors, for instance being registered on the ER is seen as a positive by most lenders, having lots of defaults is seen as a negative.  But each lender will have a different target customer base and risk appetite, and will define their criteria accordingly.  One lender may be OK with, say, up to 3 late payments in the last 3 years, whereas another may have a policy of any late payment resulting in an instant decline.

So if your CRA is low and a lender relies solely on that, how can they ascertain that the low score is due to lots of late payments, or a CCJ, or simply a thin file?  They need to be able to see the underlying data in order to see how your profile fits against their own particular lending criteria.