What Time of the Month Do Credit Scores Update?
Get clarity on when and how credit scores refresh. Understand the process behind score changes and effective ways to monitor your financial profile.
A credit score serves as a numerical representation of an individual’s creditworthiness. Lenders utilize this score to assess the risk associated with extending credit, influencing decisions on loans, interest rates, and even housing or employment applications. It functions as a dynamic snapshot of financial responsibility, reflecting how reliably an individual manages borrowed money.
How Credit Data is Reported
Creditors and lenders regularly report account activity to the three major credit bureaus: Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion. This reporting typically occurs on a monthly cycle, often aligning with a borrower’s statement closing date for credit cards. The exact day can vary for each account, meaning there is no universal fixed date for all updates.
Creditors are not legally obligated to report to all three bureaus, and some may choose to report to only one or two. This voluntary reporting means information might appear on one credit report before another, leading to slight variations between bureaus. Delays can also occur, so a recent payment or account change may not be immediately reflected.
Understanding Credit Score Updates
While credit data is generally reported monthly, credit scores themselves are not constantly recalculated. Credit scoring models, such as FICO and VantageScore, re-evaluate a score when new data is added to a credit report or when a score is specifically requested. This means a score seen today might differ from one requested hours later if new information has been processed.
Different credit monitoring services or apps may provide more frequent updates, sometimes daily or weekly, by pulling and recalculating a score based on the most current credit report data. However, this frequent recalculation does not imply the underlying credit report data changes at the same pace. The score simply reflects the report at the moment it is accessed.
Key Actions That Influence Your Score
Financial actions, once reported, can lead to changes in a credit score. Making on-time payments consistently is the most influential factor, demonstrating reliability to lenders. Conversely, late payments, especially those 30 days or more past due, can significantly harm a score and remain on a report for several years.
Changes in credit utilization, which is the amount of revolving credit used compared to the total available credit, also heavily impact scores. Keeping balances low, ideally below 30% of the credit limit, is advised. Opening new accounts, particularly multiple accounts in a short period, can briefly lower a score due to new inquiries and a shorter average age of accounts.
How to Monitor Your Credit Score
Federal law grants access to a free copy of each credit report from Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion once every 12 months via AnnualCreditReport.com. This website is the only authorized source for these free reports. Consumers can also obtain free weekly reports from this site.
Many credit card companies and banks now provide free access to credit scores to their customers, often viewable on monthly statements or through online banking portals. Various third-party providers offer free or paid credit monitoring services, which can include alerts for significant changes to a credit report. Regularly reviewing these reports and scores helps ensure accuracy and allows for the prompt disputing of any errors.