I’ve been using Monzo more and more for personal banking but the more I use their services the more conflicts I get. Credit insights suggested I started to utilising some of my flex account which has a 5k credit limit, which I started doing for most of my day to day spending which never really gets above a £1500 balance but always clear every month on a 0% basis. Using that briefly actually raised my score from good to excellent in TransUnion but then after I went over 25% credit utilisation on that one account it reduced my score even more. This was even when I have a loan with Monzo which I took about 6k from savings and almost cleared my loan account in the same month. It’s just hard to get you’re head around reducing your debt overall in one month by 6k but because one account which is always paid off in on a 0% basis effects my credit score. Even though I’m eligible for other borrowing facilities from Monzo, I can’t get an increase from Monzo on my flex account which their credit insights advised me to start using. I’m now going to start using my Amex which has an 18k limit which makes much more sense. I question why insights didn’t tell me to start spending money on my high limit Amex instead and maybe if it is going to suggest its own products to utilise maybe warn you to use them in a certain way
Don’t lose too much sleep over the numerical score, it’s made up and only visible to you, and the score itself isn’t what determines your eligibility for anything. Different credit agencies put different weight on different factors (for example Transunion lower the score as soon as an account goes over 25% usage, and again at 50% and 75%, but other credit agencies don’t). The suggestions are more guidelines on how to build good credit over time, but they’re not specifically tailored per user as such, as in there’s no specific formula that will guarantee a better score, and as I say the score itself isn’t that important anyway.
Thanks for your feedback. That’s exactly my frustration. I only started monitoring my credit score when I subscribed to Max on Monzo and whilst I agree with rules on scoring, to me it just doesn’t make any sense. I was advised by Monzo’s own credit monitoring product that I utilise their own flex product to better my credit score and instead of doing my usual spending via my traditional bank accounts or Amex, I opted for Flex instead. Because I have such a low credit limit of 5k, i small balance of £1500 which is nothing in my financial status, it credit scores me worse on the basis that because it’s more than 25% of my available credit on one credit line irrespective of my total available credit, I’m somehow a higher risk.
I’m just frustrated and feel it’s ironic that i pay for a Monzo product which suggests I utilise their own product as opposed the ones I’ve been using for some time and then when I do, my credit score actually ends up worse because I’m using their product instead of amother bank or lender where my credit limits are much healthier.
I’m now just going to stop using flex as i don’t need to defer any payments, I just did it because that’s what Monzo themselves, suggested that would help my credit score but in the end made it worse.
This is kind of why credit scores aren’t worth paying too much attention to though.
It’s true that spending on a credit account would probably improve the score but with some credit agencies spending too much reduces it. The insights can’t tell you how much to spend.
It’s a stupid game with no clear rules, but credit scores exist as a way for the credit agencies to sell you products via their apps and get commission. Beyond that, it’s just a generalisation of how people in similar circumstances to you are likely to be viewed by lenders, but again only a guide. A few points here and there doesn’t represent anything significant on your credit file. If you have a £5,000 limit and go from spending £1,500 to £1,600, the usage would go over 25% and Transunion would drop your score, but that extra £100 hasn’t suddenly made you less creditworthy. It’s just a general guide, but needs to be taken with a pinch of salt and understanding of the nuance of your own personal circumstances.
For example I have a credit card with over 75% usage on a 0% transfer offer, which looks bad to them, but they don’t know I have the entire balance sat in a savings account earning me interest until the offer expires. So the score impact is meaningless. When I pay that off the score will shoot up, but nothing in my circumstances has actually changed.
Yeah I absolutely accept your points and was overreacting. It’s just because it doesn’t make any logical sense, it’s frustrating. I’ll just keep my flex balance under that 25% threshold. Thanks for taking the time to reply.
Maybe getting monthly updates isn’t helping, my equifax score went down one month by 66 points and then went up by 80 the next month and i honestly couldn’t see any difference in my borrowing. 
Yeah, you’ll go mad trying to keep track of why the scores change. My Transunion score bounces all over the place (highest it’s ever been is 661 and it’s out of 710, lord only knows what would satisfy the rest of it), Equifax has been around 862 for years no matter what I do, and Experian sits at 999 most of the time and if it does drop it’s by less than 10 and goes back to 999 after a couple of months.
This is kinda why I don’t like them as it makes people anxious that they’re going to be seen badly by lenders, but lenders all have their own process for determining eligibility. In the US people have a single credit score and it does actually mean something, here it doesn’t. I once applied for the iPhone Upgrade Program which is operated by Barclays Partner Finance which apparently mainly uses Experian, I had a 999/999 score and got rejected, but the same company approved me for regular 2 year finance. So even with a perfect score you can still be rejected. I didn’t understand it then and still don’t now but this is what humanity does, invents systems nobody understands and makes no sense but controls our lives 
Most of the negative factors will be relative common sense. If you have 5 cards with 75%+ usage you may have a problem, if you have 5 cards with 4 at < 5% and one at 75%+ because of a one-off purchase on a 0% deal then it’s totally different. Same with living in your overdraft vs dipping into it once every 6 months. You’d probably know if you had a bad credit file without the apps and scores if your finances were all over the place. As long as you feel you’re managing things responsibly, you probably are and that’s fine. If you apply and get rejected for something then it is what it is, like with me and my 999/999 getting rejected, it goes beyond these scores.
Yeah another thing I noticed was when I cleared my mortgage my score went down over time and apparently you lose some of e score if you don’t have an active mortgage which is just mind boggling. I used to have a 999 Experian’s score and now it’s never above 970
I’ve managed a 667 with TransUnion and have no idea how to improve on that. Equifax has been at 1000 and Experian has been at 999 for as long as Monzo reported them.
I’ve got 671 with TransUnion at the moment (just gone up from 663 but I’ve no idea why!). Still, NatWest won’t increase my rather low credit limit but Lloyds, when I used their eligibility checker the other day, guaranteed 3 times the NatWest limit.
Just shows how fickle both the credit score and lenders’ internal scoring is.
I can only dream of reaching such heights 
NatWest never did with mine either.
It’s puzzling. Even with that score they say that my lack of mortgage is a negative (I paid it off a few years ago). I also have two hard searches in the last 6 months, which it also says is a negative, so it’ll be interesting to see what happens next month when that is no longer the case. I just wish NatWest would increase my limit because I regularly go over 50% on the card and sometimes over 75%. I only use it because it gives me the most cash back overall out of all my cards.
See what they give you with a new card. I had one with £5000 and they wouldn’t increase it by even £2,000, but the eligibility checker approved me for £8,100. So 4x more than the increase I requested on the original card, and that’s on top of the existing card. So made no sense on several fronts.
Similar with RBS, at the same time as this they approved me for a card with a limit of £11,900 (same group as natWest so not sure I understand the different limit), I took it and reduced it to £10,000. Few months later wanted to increase it again, wouldn’t even approve £10,500. Back to the eligibility checker, was approved for another card with the same £11,900 as before. So happy to give me a second card with that high a limit but not £500 on the previous one.
So while it’d be a hard search, if a new card gives you a higher offer you may be able to get around it that way. Or if you try RBS (might need a current account first), if it’s anything like me they’ll give you an even higher limit (and it’s the same app etc).