# Is being fully Monzo ruining my credit score? **URL:** \ **Category:** Monzo Chat\ **Created:** [26 March 2019 14:45 UTC](https://community.monzo.com/t/is-being-fully-monzo-ruining-my-credit-score/63520 "2019-03-26T14:45:56Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![thomasjamesbadger](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/monzo/user_avatar/community.monzo.com/thomasjamesbadger/32/34719_2.png) [@thomasjamesbadger](https://community.monzo.com/u/thomasjamesbadger)\ **Post date:** [26 March 2019 14:45 UTC](https://community.monzo.com/t/is-being-fully-monzo-ruining-my-credit-score/63520/1 "2019-03-26T14:45:57Z")
So here’s the thing. When I started a new job 7 months ago I decided to use it as a catalyst to go fully Monzo. But the two main credit checkers don’t recognise any of the money in my Monzo account! My score has dropped on one of these significantly, but is this related?! It’s worth noting I have a Lifetime ISA elsewhere as I am saving for a first time mortgage deposit. Is being fully Monzo damaging my credit score and the mortgage rates I may get when I go to buy a property?! ---
**Author:** ![gmclean](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/monzo/user_avatar/community.monzo.com/gmclean/32/47932_2.png) [@gmclean](https://community.monzo.com/u/gmclean)\ **Post date:** [26 March 2019 14:50 UTC](https://community.monzo.com/t/is-being-fully-monzo-ruining-my-credit-score/63520/2 "2019-03-26T14:50:54Z")
What do the two main credit checkers give as the reason your score dropped? The ones I’ve used give you reasons, usually. I can’t imagine why this would be the case, although it could be the bank identifiers not being updated so they think Monzo is still a pre-paid card, not a fully fledged, FCAS backed current account? ---
**Author:** ![nexusmaniac](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/monzo/user_avatar/community.monzo.com/nexusmaniac/32/3193_2.png) [@nexusmaniac](https://community.monzo.com/u/nexusmaniac)\ **Post date:** [26 March 2019 15:11 UTC](https://community.monzo.com/t/is-being-fully-monzo-ruining-my-credit-score/63520/3 "2019-03-26T15:11:34Z")
My credit score, for what it’s worth, is continuing to rise 🙂 I’ve been with Monzo for over 2 years now (in its Current Account form) and it hasn’t had a negative impact on my score 😁 Clearscore complains that I’ve not had a bank account open for “several years” (because Monzo doesn’t report to Equifax(?)) 😛 but on Noddle my Monzo account is happily ticking along in the green 👌 ---
**Author:** ![JustJordds](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/monzo/user_avatar/community.monzo.com/justjordds/32/29498_2.png) [@JustJordds](https://community.monzo.com/u/JustJordds)\ **Post date:** [26 March 2019 15:15 UTC](https://community.monzo.com/t/is-being-fully-monzo-ruining-my-credit-score/63520/4 "2019-03-26T15:15:55Z")
Has anything else changed in the last 7 months which could affect your credit score? Any credit card applications? Anything overdraft use? I haven’t experienced any problems with my credit score since going #FullMonzo ---
**Author:** ![rarther](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/monzo/user_avatar/community.monzo.com/rarther/32/11565_2.png) [@rarther](https://community.monzo.com/u/rarther)\ **Post date:** [26 March 2019 15:24 UTC](https://community.monzo.com/t/is-being-fully-monzo-ruining-my-credit-score/63520/5 "2019-03-26T15:24:58Z")
> [@thomasjamesbadger](#): > > the two main credit checkers don’t recognise any of the money in my Monzo account! They’re not meant to show how much money is in your current or savings account. A credit report is just a list of credit accounts and a history of how you’ve been repaying that credit. If you have a positive balance in a current account it should show as £0 on your report as that is how much credit you have borrowed Your score could have changed for a bunch of reasons but my best guess would be closing your old account could have affected the credit scoring algorithm into thinking you have less duration of account history (eg. If having a current account open for over 3 years gets you points, then you’ve just lost those points). Don’t forget that real mortgage lenders don’t use your ClearScore or Noddle or whatever score to make a decision. They pull in the data from your Experian/Equifax/Callcredit reports and run their own algorithms, which along with your salary information and other details they will put together to decide if they should lend, so any other “credit score” is only indicative and being told your clearscore has dropped ever so slightly means close to nothing. ---
**Author:** ![nickh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/7ea924/32.png) [@nickh](https://community.monzo.com/u/nickh)\ **Post date:** [26 March 2019 15:44 UTC](https://community.monzo.com/t/is-being-fully-monzo-ruining-my-credit-score/63520/6 "2019-03-26T15:44:52Z")
> [@thomasjamesbadger](#): > > Is being fully Monzo damaging my credit score and the mortgage rates I may get when I go to buy a property?! A question that has been asked many times… Impossible to know, but if I had to guess, I’d say that **yes** , being #fullMonzo does impact your credit score, and _can_ impact the lending you are offered. Nationwide recently checked my credit file, but they didn’t check Callcredit, so if I had nothing elsewhere, it would have raised some flags. The score itself _should_ be irrelevant (especially with mortgages), as they run their own checks. But until Monzo report to all 3 agencies (which is supposedly later this year), I wouldn’t close down my old legacy account. Even then… Part of the “score” is to do with your average length of financial relationship. If you have an old legacy account which you’ve had for 10 years, you can chop and change whatever else you want and the worst it will be is 5 years. Unfortunately, there is no definitive answer to the whole “credit report” thing. ---
**Author:** ![42644](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/4/fbc32d/32.png) [@42644](https://community.monzo.com/u/42644)\ **Post date:** [26 March 2019 15:46 UTC](https://community.monzo.com/t/is-being-fully-monzo-ruining-my-credit-score/63520/7 "2019-03-26T15:46:13Z")
Echoing everything @rarther said, here’s a little more information: > [@Credit scores?!](https://community.monzo.com/t/credit-scores/62916/14): > > You don’t have a single “credit score”, instead each time you apply for credit the information in your credit file is compared against the requirements of the lender for the product. Every lender has different criteria, for example some may put a higher emphasis on total outstanding debt whereas others may care much more about missed payments. Their criteria is based on their risk profile and goals which is often a certain type of customer. The lender isn’t necessarily thinking “will this person repay us?” they’re thinking “will this customer be profitable for us?” – similar but not the same. > > Your credit file contains a history of your use of credit which includes repayments, borrowing, outstanding debt and financial links. Companies like Noddle have their own criteria that is generalised based on their knowledge of the industry, for example a CCJ is _very bad_ and will lead to rejections by many lenders so Noddle (and others) know that a CCJ should have a significant negative impact on the score they give you. > > The most important single factor for your credit worthiness is being on the electoral roll, without that you’re pretty much unable to get any credit and will be outright rejected. Missed payments are a major problem too, if you ever miss a payment it’ll be on your credit file for 6 years and that is a strong indicator to lenders that you’re a bad client, you should always make payments on time. > > Available credit can be a positive and a negative depending on the circumstance. If you earn £25,000 per year and have £20,000 in available credit you are unlikely to receive an unsecured loan of £20,000 even if you have a great history of repayments, in general the cap on the amount of unsecured debt you can have is your salary – but again, every lender is different. > > Having no history is worse than having bad history, because bad history is a known quantity whereas unknown history… it’s unknown, you could be the worst client they’ve ever seen. That’s why your first credit card will rarely have a limit more than £600 and why it’s very helpful to get a mobile phone contract in your name as a teenager. Student overdrafts are an exception to this rule but that’s because they’re secured by the knowledge of student loans. > > Essentially, if you’re concerned about your credit score (which you should think about as “credit worthiness” instead) then you should: > > 1. Always make payments on time > 2. Use credit (responsibly) > > Daily spending on a credit card (with full payment of the balance every month) is a great way to build your credit worthiness, it will demonstrate that you can use credit responsibly. > [@Credit scores?!](https://community.monzo.com/t/credit-scores/62916/20): > > The time when good credit starts to matter in a serious way is when it comes to mortgages, but even then there’s nothing you can (or should do) beyond use the credit you have available to you responsibly. Avoiding negatives (missed payments, payday loans, CCJs) is most important when it comes to mortgages, having an extra paid off finance account is not going to be the difference between a mortgage or not. For the sake of clarity: switching to Monzo will not harm your mortgage prospects although closing an old account could be a negative (however I think it’s very unlikely that would have any impact on a mortgage application). More discussion is available in the full thread: [Credit scores?! - #14 by 42644](https://community.monzo.com/t/credit-scores/62916/14) ---
**Author:** ![WillP79](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/94ad74/32.png) [@WillP79](https://community.monzo.com/u/WillP79)\ **Post date:** [26 March 2019 18:04 UTC](https://community.monzo.com/t/is-being-fully-monzo-ruining-my-credit-score/63520/8 "2019-03-26T18:04:33Z")
I would say probably not. I have just increased my mortgage by 50% after being #fullmonzo nearly a year. Went through without touching the sides. ---
**Author:** ![viderz](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/monzo/user_avatar/community.monzo.com/viderz/32/29356_2.png) [@viderz](https://community.monzo.com/u/viderz)\ **Post date:** [26 March 2019 20:05 UTC](https://community.monzo.com/t/is-being-fully-monzo-ruining-my-credit-score/63520/9 "2019-03-26T20:05:45Z")
Credit scores vary for different reason, again im just in the process of buying a first home, credit score has increased as of late and been #fullmonzo for a while ---
**Author:** ![harryjms](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/monzo/user_avatar/community.monzo.com/harryjms/32/12875_2.png) [@harryjms](https://community.monzo.com/u/harryjms)\ **Post date:** [27 March 2019 11:46 UTC](https://community.monzo.com/t/is-being-fully-monzo-ruining-my-credit-score/63520/10 "2019-03-27T11:46:15Z")
My credit score has only gone up since going Full Monzo; so I don’t think Monzo can be blamed. ---
**Author:** ![harryru](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/monzo/user_avatar/community.monzo.com/harryru/32/43316_2.png) [@harryru](https://community.monzo.com/u/harryru)\ **Post date:** [27 March 2019 12:34 UTC](https://community.monzo.com/t/is-being-fully-monzo-ruining-my-credit-score/63520/11 "2019-03-27T12:34:43Z")
I only have a Monzo account and actually don’t have a regular income going into it as I live overseas at the moment. I even still use my UK credit card (no foreign transaction fees, don’t worry 😉) sometimes which means some agencies will only see my “debt” but my credit score has only gone up 🤷🏼‍♂️ ---
**Author:** ![nickh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/7ea924/32.png) [@nickh](https://community.monzo.com/u/nickh)\ **Post date:** [27 March 2019 12:50 UTC](https://community.monzo.com/t/is-being-fully-monzo-ruining-my-credit-score/63520/12 "2019-03-27T12:50:34Z")
> [@harryru](#): > > I even still use my UK credit card (no foreign transaction fees, don’t worry 😉) sometimes which means some agencies will only see my “debt” but my credit score has only gone up 🤷🏼‍♂️ I’m no expert (quite the opposite in fact), but I would have thought this was the best way to increase the “credit score”. CRA’s will see your available credit, see you are paying it back each month, and that’ll build your credit score. The fact you only have a Monzo account means that only CallCredit will see it, but depending on who your credit card reports to, the other agencies will see that, and it’ll be more beneficial to you (which is why you are seeing your score go up). > [@WillP79](#): > > I have just increased my mortgage by 50% after being #fullmonzo nearly a year. Went through without touching the sides. Worth pointing out that Mortgage applications don’t look at credit scores - They have their own checks (taken in conjunction with credit **reports** ). My recent mortgage went through, and they had no idea I had a Monzo account as they didn’t look at Call Credit/Noddle. ---
**Author:** ![JustJordds](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/monzo/user_avatar/community.monzo.com/justjordds/32/29498_2.png) [@JustJordds](https://community.monzo.com/u/JustJordds)\ **Post date:** [27 March 2019 12:57 UTC](https://community.monzo.com/t/is-being-fully-monzo-ruining-my-credit-score/63520/13 "2019-03-27T12:57:42Z")
Just a thought aswell, if you don’t actually have an overdraft (or credit facility with Monzo) the only downside in your credit rating is that not all agencies can see your balance with Monzo. However, if you’ve got credit elsewhere, and you’re paying it off, you’re unlikely to see a hit (probably see a growth) of your score. ---
**Author:** ![nickh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/7ea924/32.png) [@nickh](https://community.monzo.com/u/nickh)\ **Post date:** [27 March 2019 13:20 UTC](https://community.monzo.com/t/is-being-fully-monzo-ruining-my-credit-score/63520/14 "2019-03-27T13:20:46Z")
Yeah, although if you have a legacy account for 10 years (with no other credit or debit accounts), and then you close that down in favour of Monzo and a credit card… Your average length of financial relationship (with 2 of the 3 CRA’s), will be less than 6 months, which **could** cause your score to decrease. It’s worth just leaving the old account open, even if you do nothing with it. ---
**Author:** ![Nickkkjohnson](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/e68b1a/32.png) [@Nickkkjohnson](https://community.monzo.com/u/Nickkkjohnson)\ **Post date:** [1 April 2019 10:11 UTC](https://community.monzo.com/t/is-being-fully-monzo-ruining-my-credit-score/63520/15 "2019-04-01T10:11:21Z")
Hi, I’ve switched 3/4 Monzo from Nationwide- manually transferred Direct Debits etc. I understand and have done research about Monzo- I just wanted some reassurance. In the next couple of years, I will be looking to get a Mortgage. Wil, in any way, using Monzo as my current account (salary etc) hinder myself getting a mortgage/have a negative affect on my credit score? Ie. Will their statements be valid to use, are they recognised by main mortgage providers etc? I hope that doesn’t sound too silly, I just wanted to make sure as it’s kinda’ a big deal. Thank you! ---
**Author:** ![gmclean](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/monzo/user_avatar/community.monzo.com/gmclean/32/47932_2.png) [@gmclean](https://community.monzo.com/u/gmclean)\ **Post date:** [1 April 2019 10:12 UTC](https://community.monzo.com/t/is-being-fully-monzo-ruining-my-credit-score/63520/16 "2019-04-01T10:12:15Z")
Quite a few posts on this topic already, I searched the forums for you and found the most recent one from last week. > [@Is being fully Monzo ruining my credit score?](https://community.monzo.com/t/is-being-fully-monzo-ruining-my-credit-score/63520): > > So here’s the thing. When I started a new job 7 months ago I decided to use it as a catalyst to go fully Monzo. But the two main credit checkers don’t recognise any of the money in my Monzo account! My score has dropped on one of these significantly, but is this related?! It’s worth noting I have a Lifetime ISA elsewhere as I am saving for a first time mortgage deposit. Is being fully Monzo damaging my credit score and the mortgage rates I may get when I go to buy a property?! ---
**Author:** ![JustJordds](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/monzo/user_avatar/community.monzo.com/justjordds/32/29498_2.png) [@JustJordds](https://community.monzo.com/u/JustJordds)\ **Post date:** [1 April 2019 10:19 UTC](https://community.monzo.com/t/is-being-fully-monzo-ruining-my-credit-score/63520/17 "2019-04-01T10:19:42Z")
Having Monzo in and of itself _shouldn’t_ affect your credit score - however have a read of the thread @gmclean kindly found for you for some more ins and outs of that question. Mortgages do a different type of credit check on you and the agency that Monzo doesn’t report to (yet?) won’t affect that - so as long as you tick all of the other boxes needed by the lender you’ll be fine. A few fellow forum members have completed a mortgage with Monzo with no hassle - hopefully they’ll add some comments here. ---
**Author:** ![LifeofRiley](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/aca169/32.png) [@LifeofRiley](https://community.monzo.com/u/LifeofRiley)\ **Post date:** [1 April 2019 10:20 UTC](https://community.monzo.com/t/is-being-fully-monzo-ruining-my-credit-score/63520/18 "2019-04-01T10:20:36Z")
Keep your legacy account. If nothing more as a back-up. Nothing wrong with keeping it and having a may £100 in there spare or so. ---
**Author:** ![viderz](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/monzo/user_avatar/community.monzo.com/viderz/32/29356_2.png) [@viderz](https://community.monzo.com/u/viderz)\ **Post date:** [1 April 2019 11:25 UTC](https://community.monzo.com/t/is-being-fully-monzo-ruining-my-credit-score/63520/19 "2019-04-01T11:25:25Z")
@Nickkkjohnson popped your post in here, to tidy things up and keep conversation going ---
**Author:** ![viderz](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/monzo/user_avatar/community.monzo.com/viderz/32/29356_2.png) [@viderz](https://community.monzo.com/u/viderz)\ **Post date:** [1 April 2019 11:31 UTC](https://community.monzo.com/t/is-being-fully-monzo-ruining-my-credit-score/63520/20 "2019-04-01T11:31:39Z")
I am currently in the process of buying a house and been #fullymonzo for some time, being with Monzo doesn’t seem to have caused any issues at all. In fact, by being on Monzo Ive learnt to budget better and paid most my cards off [Next page](https://community.monzo.com/t/is-being-fully-monzo-ruining-my-credit-score/63520.md?page=2)