ID Theft

I have a credit monitoring system and my recent credit score was 635?

I went to pull my report today and it dropped to 598 I had to charge some medical things for a family member for about 2,000 dollars and used a couple hundred on another card. DO you think that's what changed it??? On the card with 2,000 I have a large available credit. I didn't think it would affect does it ??????

Public Comments

1. Yep, some of your credit score is determined by what you owe as opposed to what your limit is, irrespective of the number of cards and/or their individual balances. Is best to keep your amount owed to about half of what you are allowed to charge.
2. I'm not sure that the amount you owe is the reason. It could be, but there is another possibility. I refinanced my house last year, and my credit report showed several debts that were not mine. I had to call the companies that showed I owed them money to get these things removed. Once I did that, my score went to 800!!!!! So call these reporting agencies, get a detailed report sent to you, and find out if you are being penalized for something that's not yours. It is all too common.
3. 400-600 is an average credit rating 600-800 is top notch.
4. anytime you have a balance on a credit card it will change your score. typically it won't swing it that much unless you are over 50% of your available balance...Have you applied for new credit recently as this has a pretty dramatic effect on score. Any chance that youu've been late on a payment. If not I would check your credit report more closey t find out why there was such a chnge BTW "600-800" is NOT "top-notch"! anything below 685 is suspect and you'll find it difficult to get good terms!
5. It's hard to determine what exactly makes the credit score fluctuate. My guess is that the additional charges on your credit cards did it. In general, larger credit card balances are a negative. The lower your initial credit score, then the more likely that the additional card balances will negatively affect it.
6. all sorts of things affect your credit score, late payments, high limits, maxed out credit cards, number of cards, best thing is to keep them opened but with low balances.
7. temporarily...remember those credit report systems are only an estamate...your actual credit score may vary greatly from that it tells you... as for the large charges...it may temporarily affect your score because of 2,000 dollars current debt... check it once you're paid off and you should be better
8. it could possibly be because your debt ratio is too high which means your spend more credit than they think you make and can pay back, or it could be that you missed a payment on something, or if someone made a lot of inquiries on your credit... have you been applying for new cards or loans?
9. Anytime you use your credit, it takes away from your availability, which lowers your score.
10. No doubt those new charges lowered your score. 30% of your score is bases upon current ballances due in ratio to your credit limits. The more debt you assume, the more likely you are to probably default. CRA's don't care that the charge was for medical emergency or what, all they figure is you now owe more. Here is a link to download a free pdf file regarding FICO scores and how they are calculated. http://pueblo.gsa.gov/cic_text/money/creditscores/your.htm All about FICO scoring.
11. If that's the only thing that changed, then that's what caused the change. Your best score comes from a used credit of 1-9% of available revolving charges. They also consider your debt vs. income. Remember the credit monitoring services are only approximations, and they keep changing their formulas.