What is the range of credit scores?

Factual Questions
1

Wikipedia says the FICO score ranges from 300 to 850, but I subscribe to TransUnion’s TrueCredit credit monitoring service, and the range they show goes up to 990. They rate credit scores on an A-F scale, and the threshhold for an A rating is 900. TrueCredit shows all three credit reporting agencies, and all the scores go up to 990.

So what is the deal? Does TransUnion not use FICO? What about Equifax and Experian? Are there other credit scores besides FICO?

2

Is it fair to say that you are asking:

  1. What is the absolute best credit score you can possibly get? E.g. a godlike credit rating where you are more trustworthy than the most trusted names in banking? If you have a 4.0 GPA in college, and get another “A”, your GPA doesn’t go up to 4.1.

  2. What is the absolute worst credit score you can possibly get? E.g. is there a point at which you have so many bankruptcies, so many delinquencies, so many late payments, so many charge offs, and so many accounts in collection that adding another derogatory item cannot push the score further because it is already at rock-bottom according to the algorithm? E.g. in college, you generally can’t get below a 0.0 GPA - additional “F” grades don’t drop it any further, and practically, if you have even one decent grade, suddenly getting straight “F”'s is going to make your GPA approach 0.0 asymptotically until the difference becomes a rounding error and it finally drops to 0.0?

3

The 3 credit bureaus came up with their own credit score to compete with FICO. it’s called VantageScore which is what you are seeing at the TransUnion site.

4

Thank you! I have been wondering this for years.

Does anybody use FICO any more? If the Big Three all use VantageScore, is FICO even relevant?

5

Yes, pretty much everybody uses FICO when checking your credit score. The one that might not be relevant is VantageScore. It’s only relevant because that’s what you get access to with credit tracking services from the 3 reporting bureaus. You can get access to your FICO score if you pay FICO for it.

6

Well that sucks! Why am I paying TransUnion to see a score than nobody uses? :smack:

7

FYI, you can see your FICO for free (or a very close approximation of it which they call TransRisk) on CreditKarma. It can also show you the VantageScore, which interestingly is actually lower for me than my FICO, despite the higher range. And yes, it is a legitimate free service.

8

Thanks for the link, that was useful. Ugh, my credit has improved over the last two years, just not fast enough.