Can My Corporate Credit Card Impact My FICO Score?
April 26th, 2010 | Author: weissheiss
A couple of late credit card payments can make all the difference between a decent credit score and a rejected loan application – but what if your employer is the one paying your credit card bills?
Most people understand that it’s important to keep your credit score in the best possible shape, by paying your bills on time and keeping your ratio of debt versus available credit low. But corporate credit cards are often over-looked, and – according to Fair Issac Corporation (FICO) – they can actually impact your credit score the same way that personal cards can.
If you were required to sign up for a corporate credit card for work expenses, the activity on that card may or may not show up on your credit report, depending on the credit provider. If it does show up, then it will affect your score, simple as that.
You won’t know if the activity is reported or not unless you check your credit score; you can check this for free once every twelve months at AnnualCreditReport.com.
Once you receive a copy of your credit report, check your revolving credit accounts, which is a list of every non-fixed credit facility you have, such as credit cards, store cards and any other line of credit.
If your corporate credit card is not listed, that means the activity on your card is not being reported each month. If your corporate card is listed, then your business spending and repayment patterns could have an impact on your FICO score.
So why is this important? Consider this scenario: say you’re late in lodging an expense claim with your boss, and your employer is then late in applying the payment to your corporate card. As a result, a business lunch you paid for on April 5 doesn’t get paid until June 1. Assume a similar situation takes place again the following month.
Meanwhile, in the first week of June, you travel out of town for a conference and charge
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