I’ve been taking a bit more interest in looking at my credit reports lately as I recently wanted to apply for and successfully got a credit card.
When looking at my credit report via the three CRAs I noticed that my Nationwide current account and mortgage updates around the same date each month and updates regularly (each month) as does my Virgin Media broadband.
I noticed Startling seems to take a bit longer to update via all CRAs and the date on when the account status updates seems to change each month.
As of now my Starling account status was last updated July 2023 via Experian and 1st August 2023 via Equifax and TransUnion whereas my other accounts are September 2023.
Would anyone who also has a Starling account and checks their credit reports regularly notice anything similar to this?
I contacted Starling CS about it and they said updates they sent to CRAs occur on random dates each month and can take a while to update.
I don’t have an overdraft with Starling but I don’t have an overdraft with the other current accounts that are updated regularly as well, so I don’t think the lack of overdraft is a factor.
Not the same but I had a poor experience with Starling regarding my credit file.
A closed account was reporting an incorrect flat number - I complained and they insisted I must have had it wrong the whole time I had an account. Thankfully I dug out an old pdf statement and they handled the correction after I filed it with the credit reference agencies.
Thanks for your reply Rexx. I’m glad to hear you were able to get the issue resolved using the statement you dug out. That is terrible customer service to insist that the error was on you when it wasn’t.
I can’t say I’ve been impressed with Starling’s customer support, with replies being basic copy and paste replies which can sometimes take days to receive.
My Starling account is rarely used, only for some online subscriptions I no longer use as of a few months ago. I would be quite happy to close the account but as it’s my oldest open bank account at the moment with my Nationwide account the second oldest (1 year after Starling was opened) I am a bit afraid of what impact closing the Starling account would have on my credit worthiness.
Equifax and TransUnion mention Starlings update frequency is Periodically or Other whereas my other accounts show as Monthly, so it may be Starling data is updated at random dates.
I likely will close the Starling account then as I have three other current accounts that provide what I need.
I have a 5 year fixed term mortgage since September 2022 and a 22 month 0% purchase credit card since last month, so I don’t think I have anything super important coming up that would be impacted.
What’s that based on, please? Every lender will take a different view (or no view at all) on account length, nobody outside of those individual lenders knows what the stat is.
‘Keep your longest held account(s) open’ is solid advice. ‘Make sure you have one account over 6 years’ sounds very arbitrary to me.
It is arbitrary, but every platform from MSE CreditClub, Experian and Equifax all said it last time I checked (I believe, I can’t actually remember but I’m pretty sure it was 6 years. Same w/ the electoral register 6 years recommendation)
From a personal perspective, I’m fairly sure it’s made little personal difference to me. Like many here, I chop and change bank accounts all the time and my credit scores on both Experian and Clearscore are the max you can get. I have however ensured I’ve had a continuous presence on the Electoral register for over 2 decades. The 6 year tenure on a bank account doesn’t even figure in my financial life. No issues getting a mortgage or a loan. I guess it depends entirely on personal circumstances.
Thanks for all this valuable information everyone.
I’ve been going on a bit of a spring clean with closing accounts I no longer use (younger accounts) so will be interesting to see the effect this has on my credit report in the coming weeks when the account closures are reported.
In regard to the original issue with Starling reporting slowly to the CRAs. I’ve checked my credit report via TotallyMoney (TransUnion) today and Starling shows Last Updated - 1st Sep so it would appear it is taking TransUnion around a little longer than three weeks to update this data.
The other CRAs are still yet to report but I suspect it will be a similar scenario to TransUnion.
It will be interesting to see how quick my Starling closure and TSB opening will take to show on my credit reports.
I’ll post back with the effect the closing of the Starling account has on my credit score when the reports show the account as closed.
Credit scores are really nothing to get hung up on. They are not seen by any lenders, who all have their own internal scoring systems. They’re really just a way of ‘gamifying’ the system by the CRAs (who are now all credit brokers) to encourage you to apply for more credit.
It can take weeks for CRAs to be updated. I’ve got stuff on my credit reports that I paid off 2 months ago that are still showing as owing. Same for bank accounts that I’ve closed that are still showing as active and live, Starling being one of them.
Thanks for your reply. I’ll definitely keep this in mind when I notice any dips in my credit score. I noticed the constant bombardment of in app loan and credit card offers, makes it hard to actually find parts of the credit report easily in some of the apps such as Credit Karma.
Reassuring to hear I’m not the only one experiencing delays such as this.
I noticed Barclaycard seemed to appear as a new credit card very quickly across all CRAs for me (after a few days) with the balance being reflected correctly each month but credit balance on my Virgin Credit Card can be outdated for up for 4-6 weeks.
New current accounts seem to take a minimum of 4-6 weeks to appear based on my observations, so looks like closed accounts and new accounts may take generally around the same time to be reported as closed /appear in the credit report, although I’m thinking this will vary considerably based on the bank/building society and CRAs they report to.
