Talk about a “perfect storm”. In April last year I got a letter from CITI that our “credit facility” or commercial line of credit was being frozen. We had a limit of $240K and we were currently using 23K of this. We were prohibited from writing more checks and our credit limit was reduced to outstanding balance. Pretty simple stuff.
What i never would have never believed is the effect this had on my credit score. When we had 23K on 240K limit we were using 10% of available…suddenly we were using 100% of a 23K limit. In two months i lost 35 points and went below 700 FICO…the first time in 22 years. This in turn made my personal cc’s reset from 6.9% to 19.9% and over doubled my payments.
We have gotten the line of credit down to 9K and my personal cc’s to 12K but I am very upset. These credit companies acted legally but their actions had unintended consequences for me.
I am thinking of telling my credit card companies to stick it…either reset my old rate or kiss off. I am livid.
Anyone else have any experience in this kind of thing?
Frustrated…and to make matters worse my 19 year old has a 45 point HIGHER FICO score! OMG I think of this as force fed humility LOL
Greg, follow through with your plastictomy and get out the scissors. Dealing with credit cards, you are handling snakes, handle them long enough and you will get bit.
Getting shed of those credit cards will eliminate a source of aggrevation from your life.
As for that FICO the “I love debt this much” number, it really does not matter outside the realm of other consumer debt lenders. (assuming of course that debts have been paid)
I feel your pain Greg. AMEX did the same thing to me and my mortgage broker. Cut both of our credit lines in half, so now I am waiting to see how much it will drop my credit score.
Some way to say thanks to a customer of 10 years…my goal is to wipe out all my credit debt this year with land/home deals. I am tired of working for the banks!
I had this same thing happen with a couple of cards in the past 3 months. A $23K line was cut to the balance of $1223 and then the account was closed “at the request of the grantor” and another card that I hadn’t been using was cancelled “at the request of the account holder”. I haven’t had the courage to peek at my score, but concur that eliminating my reliance on credit cards and LOC can only strengthen my position. I have too little control over this source of funding. I used to believe I had control over it by making sure I paid on time and kept my score way up there, but the rules have changed.
I am hoping that the criteria for FICO scoring will adjust quickly to this new credit landscape.