When you cry “Fire”, you expect there is a fire. When you cry “Wolf”, you expect a predator is coming. The VantageScore created a major crisis this week that reached all the way to the White House. Unfortunately, there was no crisis, no fire, no wolf. It was all about nothing.
This is a big one. Congratulations Vantage Score, you got millions of consumers excited and upset all about nothing. Nothing!
Great Lakes is a student loan lender based in Minnesota. The company was just following the federal government's directive to allow students to skip on their student loan payments. The company reported such loans as "Deferred" to the credit bureaus. That is a common practice. What happened next is just plain wrong.
The Vantage Score is a model that tries to provide a consumer credit score. It is different than the lender's FIOC credit scores. The Vantage Score declines whenever someone defers a payment on a loan. The FICO score does not.
Consumers who have been following the Vantage Score saw their number decline from the reported deferred student loan payments without realizing that Vantage Score meant nothing to their loan approvals with their lenders. Nothing! A lot of consumers were mad at Great Lakes for reporting such information to their credit report without realizing this disconnection.
There is no emergency. There is no problem with your lender's FICO scores from having Great Lakes report a deferred student loan payment.
As a result of the lack of transparency, the Vantage Score created a crisis, when there was none.
This issue simply shows it is imperative that consumers follow their lenders FICO Scores, given here with My Credit Plan.