Stoozing and Rate-Tarting

How to use your credit history to help with stoozing

At the beginning of your stoozing career

Ideally, you should get a copy of your credit report at the beginning of your stoozing career, so that you can:

• See what information gets reported to the lenders and begin to build up your knowledge and understanding of what is important to them.
• Check to see if you have any unused credit cards or store cards that you no longer need or fortgotten about. You should close these down to reduce the amount of credit you have available to you. The higher the amount of credit you have available, then the less likely you are to get offered more credit.
• Correct any errors in your report e.g. a card that you have closed but is not showing as 'settled'. The CRAs have a legal obligation to correct any errors that are on your file. They wont just take your word for it, but will check back with the lenders on your behalf.
• Correct other errors such as incorrect associations. Your credit history will contain references to people who are financially associated with you (e.g. if you have a joint bank account or mortgage). These can be out of date or, sometimes, in error. If the other person has a poor credit record it can affect your rating, so you should ensure that it is accurate.
• If you have a credit card that has not been reported to the CRAs, then that is useful information to know. It means the card, its credit limit and your current usage of the card is not seen by other lenders which may help you to get higher limits. There would be little point closing this card so, you could use it as your main purchasing card.

Why is all this important?

It is important, because stoozers often push their credit rating to the limit in order to maximise their earnings. The more accurate your credit report is, then the more money you can make from stoozing and/or the less likely you are to damage your credit rating. While it is not essential to get your credit report before stoozing, you should get a copy early on. Consider getting your report free using the Experian trial, or paying £2 to get the statutory report from Experian or one of the other CRAs.

During Your Stoozing Career

It is sensible to keep an eye on your credit report to ensure that card closures are getting reported and that balance data is up to date. You can do this by requesting a copy of your credit file 2 or 3 times a year and this is perfectly adequate for many stoozers. However others, who want to get the maximum return from their activities, would benefit from having access to their credit report at any time by using a service such as Experians CreditExpert or Equifaxs CreditWatch Gold.

I have used CreditExpert for the last two years to support my stoozing efforts. I find it invaluable when moving from one set of credit cards to the next. I take great care to time my credit card applications so that I can maximise the likelihood of a successful application and the likelihood of a good credit limit. To do so, I take the guesswork out of when a card closure will be reported to the CRAs. After requesting that the lender closes a card, I log on to CreditExpert to check my credit report online every few days until I see it showing as 'settled'(i.e. closed). Only then will I apply for a new card, with full certainty that the new card issuer will see that I no longer have that old credit limit available to me.

If I need to apply for a new card before the old one appears as 'settled', I will still do my best to wait until the old one is, at least, showing a nil balance. Rarely will I go ahead and apply for a new card until an earlier one is not showing as settled or with a nil balance. On the very rare occasions that I do so, I know that I am pushing my luck and wont get too upset if I get a poor credit limit or a rejection.

Not everyone will want to time all their applications so precisely, but the higher my stooz pot gets, the more attention I pay to these kinds of detail. My stooz pot has recently been at an all time high at over £90,000 and I have recently closed down a card. I really want to ensure it is showing as 'settled' before applying for another. I have another card which expires next month, so I may halt further applications until one is showing as settled and the other is showing as a nil balance.

Although some may consider £5.99 per month as an unnecessary expense, I see it as part of my stoozing 'business expenses'. My stoozing profits are in excess of £2,000 per annum so having costs of less than 2.5% is reasonable for me. If my stoozing profits were £200, I would probably not use the service, unless I had other pressing reasons to do so e.g. if I was about to apply for a mortgage or other important financial commitments.

How to use your credit history to help with rate-tarting

Although stoozers and rate-tarts use the same sorts of techniques and look for the same things in credit cards, there are some fundamental differences.

• The rate tart is paying off real debt, whereas the stoozer is artificially creating debt. This means that they have a different outlook on credit cards.
• Overall the rate tart is losing money to credit cards, whereas the stoozer is making money from credit cards. Again this means the outlook has to be different.

These differences mean that protecting or improving a credit rating is even more important to the rate tart than the stoozer. An inability to get another 0% Balance Transfer deal means significantly increased debt repayments for the rate-tart, but only a loss of some 'free' money to the stoozer. The rate-tart has a greater need to be able to get additional cheap credit while paying off real debt, so his/her credit rating is very important.
Serious rate tarts who are paying off debts should check their credit histories as regularly as stoozers and should check all the same things that a stoozer should check (see above). However, you want to do this while minimising your expenses, so consider making use of free trials and the statutory reports which cost only £2.

Disclaimer

The purpose of this article is to explain the important role that credit reports play in stoozing. It explains how they can be used to a greater or lesser degree, depending on the objectives and approach of the individual stoozer. It is based on Clarimans real life stoozing activities over the last 2 years, during which he has used Experian's CreditExpert service. Links to all sources of Credit Report information can be found in the table on our main site pages.

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