Focus should be on the demographic of people who donât know as opposed to those who donât care. Not sure who said anything about lectures. Articles is just fine.
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Some lenders use their own scoring system others will use data from CRAs if they do not have a profile for you (for example where you have no previous relationship with them).
What is important to know is that credit scores alone are not the only factor but they are a factor.
However, like I said, none of them use the NUMBER. It is fictional. You just demonstrated my point that educating people would be beneficial.
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What does a credit score mean within the context of a joint account? Will people be able to see a credit score for a joint account?
No but what it does do is give an indication of credit worthiness and how an individualâs credit history is likely to be perceived by a lender and an easy way to do this is to represent it by way of a score.
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Iâm in the TestFlight group, any way to test this early?
Cheers,
James
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Your credit score is related to you as an individual and not to any particular accounts, so no - you wouldnât see a score for a joint account. However, your financial connections and your joint account usage might impact your credit score. Hope that makes sense!
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Thanks for that, just to clarify, would that mean viewing my credit score via my current account, even though I donât use that as my main account, would be my actual credit score?
Your credit score is based on your overall account utilisation (not specifically one bank account) but all of them + certain utility bills/phone contracts + any credit you might have taken. We have a great blog post explaining credit score in more detail: https://monzo.com/blog/2018/08/09/what-is-a-credit-score
It would be a better blog post if it didnât conflate the internal âcredit scoreâ that a particular bank/lender might assign you based on their own rules and what sort of customer they are looking to lend to at any particular time, with the fictional credit scores that CRAs like TransUnion create that clearly have no relevance to lenders as they never see them.
The phrase âcredit scoreâ is used to mean more than one thing in the blog post and as such it is misleading. The problem here is that no lender will disclose the credit score they give you as that is commercially sensitive information and so we are left with the fictional scores created by CRAs which banks donât even use.
Maybe Monzo could break some ground here and reveal your Monzo credit score so that all those people who say they have excellent TransUnion scores but Monzo wonât give them an overdraft can understand why and do something about it? 
Itâs an entirely different situation in the USA where people have a FICO score which is used by many banks, and it seems to me these US companies like TransUnion are trying to make this model fit the UK where things are different. It also gets people signing up to get hint and tips for how to improve their TransUnion score.
Itâs also worth pointing out that even if you are interested in your credit score from one CRA that not all lenders report to all CRAs so any score assigned by one of them is possibly based on incomplete information. As the blog post says, you can sign up to see your score with all three CRAs in the UK for free and then make up your own mind if you think the scores are useful
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Definitely a good step in being transparent 
Credit Karma (Transunion) really are the worst though.
Monzo for example would not give me loan (ÂŁ750 OD on the 39.9% rate) yet Nationwide were happy to give me a ÂŁ2k overdraft and ÂŁ10k loan with 7.9% APR.
Frustrating really!
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Why is it frustrating?
You got a good deal with Nationwide. All it means is that you donât fit the risk profile Monzo is aiming for. I wouldnât lose sleep about it.
As for Credit Karma, the recent updates to their app are very good. Itâs a very good app now.
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Thatâs nothing to do with Transunion. Monzo are setting their own lending criteria really high as theyâre new to lending.
Source: I spoke to the lending team about my ineligibility for a Monzo loan.
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Was more frustrating at the level of differentiation thatâs all
In saying that, I do fully understand and appreciate that lending criteria is different etc.
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Good idea like t see it in in place
We have 8 uses of the word fictional so far in this thread.
The CRA score is essentially doing the same thing as lenders in coming up with a risk value.
Its tied to your specific report rather than an arbitrary number plucked out of nowhere.
Lots of theories that the CRA bumps it up and down on purpose to sell their products.
If you track it for a bit youâll see it only goes down when you do things that lenders wouldnât like, and increases when youâre showing signs of stability and history of reliable payments.
So a high score with TransUnion is an indication you are likely to be seen as low risk by a lender but not a guarantee. If they are giving you a shit score then thereâs probably a reason or two why, but again no guarantee a particular lender wonât accept you.
Anyway fictional is the wrong term, its based on facts and logic that apply to everyone. If you had two people same age, identical lives, identical financial history, down to living in the same homes for the same time etc they would have the same score.
Its still a good idea for people to check the factors affecting their score as these will inevitably be similar to what the majority of lenders are looking for.
With the majority thereâs nothin to do, make sure youâre on the electoral roll at your address and keep paying your bills! You could check you donât have a financial connection with someone you are no longer with as they could be having a negative impact if they are deemed a greater risk.
Donât keep creating loads of new accounts within a short space of time or you could look desperate (but a lender might not care at all). A personal loan is most likely to be fine, but a payday loan is a high risk sign of being desperate for cash and shows no financial planning for rainy days.
Bankruptcies, CCJs, and victim of fraud markers I would assume are the biggies in making lenders go 
Whilst you could take a credit card to help demonstrate a credit limit and utilisation, thereâs no guarantee a lender sees that as a good thing. Wouldnât it be fresh if Monzo went this has no impact in our decision.
Credit limit
A higher credit limit can indicate to lenders that youâre a lower risk as a borrower.
Payment history
Lenders want to know that you make your payments on time to know that you honour your financial commitments.
Credit utilisation
Keep using less than 25% of your credit to help your score. Lenders prefer to see that youâre not using too much of your credit limit.
Time on electoral roll
To lenders, your time on the electoral roll helps prove your presence at the address on your applications and suggests responsible behaviour that is less likely to result in non-payment.
New accounts
Lenders prefer to see that you havenât opened any new accounts in the last 6 months. Too many new accounts increases your obligations, making you potentially less likely to meet new commitments.
Age of credit
Lenders like to see how long youâve been managing active credit for. The more financial history you have, the more chances to prove that you can meet your obligations and organise your finances responsibly.
Mortgage
Holding an active mortgage loan is an indicator of financial stability. Evidence of stability is an important factor to lenders who usually consider homeowners less of a risk.
As mentioned above your report is only half the story, if Monzo can go further and show their affordability assumptions that will be an eye opener and will help explain why it thinks people with good/great/excellent reports are being told nope or given shitty rates/limits.
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Will the user be able to disable this fictional score fixture ?
(I used to work developing credit algorithms so no mansplaining about credit thanks)
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Turning into a running tally.
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Phil, I wish you wouldnât mansplain everything. Tsk! 
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I was going to write an overly woke reply saying I never said I was a man, and that the word mansplaining wasnât correctly used in the situation. But that would be patronising.
Iâm sure my writing style gets on a lot of peopleâs tits.
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