wonwon

 One possible answer -  The nightmare of NPSL accounts.   Check on your current credit cards.  See if anyone of them being "upgraded" to the Visa signature card or WORLD master card.  These are No Pre-set Spending Limit accounts.  This change will make your existing credit limit suddenly disappear in your credit report. 

I had that experience.  Both Chase and Citibank are doing this to a lot of customers.  These banks simply saying that your credit limit is now called "access line".  Even though you still see the amount on your statement, the bank will no longer report that to the credit bureaus. 

Consequence is --- your credit utilization ratio or debt ratio will be thrown off.  When a few of your credit cards become NPSL, the credit line will simply disappear from your credit report.   If your credit limit was $100,000 and $60,000 of your credit limit suddenly become "access line" (which only known by the bank and not the credit bureaus) ,  your total available credit limit in the credit report will be only $40,000 !!!!  That will make a NEGATIVE impact on your credit score!!!

If that's the case, just call up the bank and ask to speak with an account manager( Chase now call them Senior Service Specialist), they will allow you to go back to the original type of non-NPSL cards that you used to have.   Your will be issued new cards that will no longer carry the word "World" on Mastercard, and no longer see the word "Signature" on the reissued Visa card. 

I just found out this NPSL issues and corrected all the problems now. 

 One possible answer -  The nightmare of NPSL accounts.   Check on your current credit cards.  See if anyone of them being "upgraded" to the Visa signature card or WORLD master card.  These are No Pre-set Spending Limit accounts.  This change will make your existing credit limit suddenly disappear in your credit report. 

I had that experience.  Both Chase and Citibank are doing this to a lot of customers.  These banks simply saying that your credit limit is now called "access line".  Even though you still see the amount on your statement, the bank will no longer report that to the credit bureaus. 

Consequence is --- your credit utilization ratio or debt ratio will be thrown off.  When a few of your credit cards become NPSL, the credit line will simply disappear from your credit report.   If your credit limit was $100,000 and $60,000 of your credit limit suddenly become "access line" (which only known by the bank and not the credit bureaus) ,  your total available credit limit in the credit report will be only $40,000 !!!!  That will make a NEGATIVE impact on your credit score!!!

If that's the case, just call up the bank and ask to speak with an account manager( Chase now call them Senior Service Specialist), they will allow you to go back to the original type of non-NPSL cards that you used to have.   Your will be issued new cards that will no longer carry the word "World" on Mastercard, and no longer see the word "Signature" on the reissued Visa card. 

I just found out this NPSL issues and corrected all the problems now. 

Cabokid, you can simply tell the car salesman that you don't need a loan and you are going to buy in cash.  Another way is similar to home shopping.  You go to your bank or any loan orgininator and ask for a pre-approved loan letter.  You just fill out a simply form for the loan person to calculate how much you can afford to buy your car and how much loan you may need.  Very easy.

I have 19 active accounts and I still get an "A" for Total Accounts. Seems the formula is little complicated.

I heard that adding your name to someone else credit card would help you to create some form of credit history.

I have seen different opinion about this from different websites. Dear AppleRules, I don't mean to be impolite. But just out of curiosity, would you please explain further what is your opinion based upon?

When you mention "credit score algorithms", are you referring to all 3 credit bureaus and the FICO company and that is based on your insider understanding of their operation?

Thanks for GamingG's advice. You are just like an angel giving us insight and guidance.

You mention that viable option of using the card and pay it off before the statemt came. I did that too. I still not quite understand the advantage of that.

Do you mean that this act only helps to prevent the bank to close down the credit card account for inactivity? Will they give us any advance notice first? Have you heard of any bank that would kill the card without any last warning?

I understand that some issuers would report $0 to the credit bureau if I pay off in full before the statement closing date. Please explain what would that affect our credit score?

Is it true that even all my cards statement appear $0 (because I pay them off As soon as I used them), it will still be a positive factor in credit score because "the account is current" and no overdue??

How will the actual activity of each of my cards be contribute to my credit score?

I had the exact mistake and similar situation. Before the wonderful website like Credit Karma and Quizzle appear, I had closed several of my credit cards because of personal favorite of their reward system or card design.

However, I guess the main reason for my credit score drop is the sudden unreasonable stupid frantic cut of my credit line by banks like BOA. BOA is the worst bank doing that. They cut down 75% of my credit lines without any reason. Chase did that to me too.

I had never bankrupt, no late payment, no debt, fair utilization, no nothing. I also want to find out how to get my score fr 787 up to over 800 again.

Aliefduffy, please explain again how you can make the special B.T. offer "twice" for the same card??

Great advice！

Depending on each bank's policy, there may be one bank that may approve you. Keeep trying and calling different banks. Most likely, a credit union may be the one who would get you approved rather than those big name commercial bank.

Use the feature on this website named "Credit Simulator".
Just click on the first tap on top of the page called "My credit" and find out the simulated score after scroll down toward the bottom of the page, click "yes" in the section named "Pay off my credit balances".

Dear LaCereza18, please name any banks that would charge a non-activity fee. Thanks very much.

Thanks for the quick response by GamingG. I really hope that the score will increase "drastically" as you said. However, I have a conflicted impression by testing that possibility on Credit Karma's "My Credit Simulator". Even though I select "yes" at "Pay off all credit card balances", the simulator score didn't move up a point.

I always max out the credit line when I took the 0% balance transfer offer fr a credit card. Like the card that I owe $20K acutally has a crdit line of $20500. So I am puzzled: How come I can't improve my score when paying off that $20K??? How can I bring up my score more??

Thanks for reminding me about my utilization. In fact, I have successfully move most of the credit line of the 2 newest cards to the other cards I have with the same bank and left only $100 behind. So that if I close that account, my total available credit will still be almost the same (99.9%) as before. (Many banks no longer allow moving credit line among different cards from the same bank) .

I really appreciate your suggestions listed in your last paragraph. I have done all except the last one. Here is a new question regarding "limiting the no. of cards that report a balance other than $0 each month".

Is is a better practice to just charge a small amount (less than $10, used in fast food or supermarket) on each card each month?

Or, if it's better to charge something over $10 each other month on each of my 19 credit cards?

I still want to improve my credit score. Please advise. I have a credit score of 787 (from Credit Karma) down from over 800 a yr ago before the banking crisis when all my credit card companies suddenly cutting down 50% to 75% OF MY ORIGINAL CRDIT LINE. Even though I have over 52 total credit card accounts but most of them were closed by me and now only have 19 active accts. Never bankrupt, never overdue, paid off every month and once a yr I would take $30K to $40K balance transfer money out for 6 months and pay it off before the 0% interest expired. Average age of my credit credit opened is 11 yrs. My total credit line is over $310K. My average balance on other credit card expanse is just a few hundreds dollars AND all paid off every month. My Debt to income ratio is 29% while I still had a $20,000 balance transfer on one of my credit cards which I will pay off in 1 week. I also wonder if my score will be increased if I cancel one or 2 of my newer cards (boa card opened in 2005 & a Citibank card opened in 2003). While my oldest credit card was opened in 1991 and another one in 1992, will I be able to increase at least the average age of all my credit card if I cancel these younger cards?

The feature of Chsed freedom card appeared here and on Chase own website is somewhat misleading and deceiving: "Get 5% Cash Back offers in popular rotating categories like gas, groceries, airlines, home improvement and many more "

The fact is , these categories is not good for the year round.
It is not the 15 everyday spending categories that Chase Freedom card used to have before.

Every 3 months, the rotating categories are different and customer must enroll quarterly to be eligible.

Just found out from the Chase customer service, all my 3 Chase freedom credit cards, one mastercard, and 2 visa, has phased out the 3% freedom rewward system based on the 15 daily spending categories. Instead, they put in the 1% reward system named ultimate reward and use a different website for customer to track down the redemption http://wwww.ultimateRewards.com

I asked Chase why their website still talk about the 5% reward for ...... I was told that the 5% description is a very vague and brief only to lure new customers so that they will not see the whole system clearly (I will explain at the end) becasue Chase is now copying the Discover Card "more" system which give customers 5% reward on limited and seasonal categories - a rotation system. Just like currently, you can earn 5% in drug store, lawn, furnishing stores from April 1 to June 31. Then there is a catch, customer must call in to enroll to this rotational 5% reward spending categories.

Besdies, since I also has a Chase bank account, I am given the status of "Freedom Exclusive" status which allows me to get 10 ultimate points for each transaction on my freedom card, plus 10% extra point on top of the 1 point=$1 spending amount. It took me several phone calls to c.s.reps to clarify this complicated system.

In summary, the current Chase freedom card has 4 rules in the reward system :
1) 1 point for each dollar on any spending
2) 10 points for each transaction
3) 10 % extra points for each transaction - for customers who has Chase banking account
4) 5% on rotational spending categories (changes every 3 months) must be enrolled separately for every quarterly change.

Afterall, customer now spending $100 will only earn 120 points = 1.2% reward for anything other than the seasonal / rotational categories

If customer uses the card 10 times and $10 each, the points earn will be 100+(10x10)+ 10 extra points = 210 points. = 2.1% reward.

Chase said that the small transaction on their credit card will help Chase to make more money and that's why customers are rewarded more for small amount transaction.

I forget to say thanks to credit karma for providing such a great service. Just hope that you would allow me to edit on my comment after submitting it. I am able to do that in other kind of websites.

Why Credit Karma still posted the outdated information about the reward percentage of Chase freedom credit card. I have 3 Chase freedom credit card (due to merger of banks) and about 6 months ago, all of these freedom cards reward system has been changed.
The 5% reward has been cut down to only 3% to the top 3 of 15 "everyday" spending categories such as gas, drug store, cable bills, grocery stores, etc.

Thanks very much to unfold the mystery of credit score. Great article with good examples. I have asked around for 2 years about this kind of info from bankers, friends and internet but not very successful.

Question 1: How would the credit score be affected if I consolidate 2 credit cards and combined the credit lines into one card? That means I would have fewer number of cards but same credit line. Would that help to increase my score at all? I need to have higher score to get the best mortgage interest rate ASAP. If that wouldn't help, what else can I do? I already used your websites Tools and calculators and tested on the credit simulator.

Just for my background: I got 791 from CreditKarma and 685 from Quizzle.com (a big difference that is unexpectedly more than 50). In Aug 2008， I had 14 credit cards (on my name) and an additional of 5 credit cards (Joint account with my spouse) and the total credit line for all 19 cards were $320K. At that time, my FICO score was 734 (free from the Juniper Credit card）.

However, after the economic tsunami, the bank of america suddenly slash 50% (value of $110K) of my credit line of the 5 credit cards with them even though I have paid on time and paid off balance every month for years. They use ridiculous excuse by saying that I don't seem need the large credit line because my average spending was only a hundred or two each month even though every year I had intentionally accepting their 0% balance transfer money into my savings account (varies around $50K to $90K each）and paid them off in a few months just to create some activities. Never late and never spend over limit.

Question 2: Recently I have decreased the number of credit accounts into half by closing some accounts on my own request. I now have only 12 credit card accounts (7 individual credit cards and 5 joint cards) with $280K credit line. I only have $50K balance on one card now. Am I considered low or high credit card utilization rate? (should I divide $50K by $280K to get the utilization rate? Is it 17.8%??)

I am also apply for mortgage to purchase a home. I checked with HSBC, TD BANK, Chase, and some local community banks like FIRST AMERICAN INTERNATIONAL BANK, Atlantic Stewardship Bank, etc. Our findings show that Wells Fargo has the strictest criteria to approve a mortgage. That's why they would not average out the credit score from all 3 agencies but use the lowest score to make the customer paying the highest interest rate. The loan officers that give me info are supposed to base on their understanding of the underwriter's guidelines. Even making friends with the president of a bank should not has any help for the underwriter to approve your mortgage application.

I heard that the local and smaller community banks and credit union would be more flexible in the process of mortgage application.

Don't forget that whatever quoted to you by the loan officers of either a broker firm or by a lender would provide no gurrantee. They are just sales persons lure people to pay the application fee and start the application process. They are not responsible nor care if you can be approved or not because they can easily blame of the underwriter who actually process and approve/deny your application.

Just be careful with what these loan officers said to you before making them put the info down in writing.