Credit Sense

Credit Sense is a comprehensive Credit Score program offered as part of PA Central’s Online Banking and Mobile App. You get your latest credit score and report, and an understanding of key factors that impact the score.

Credit Sense also monitors your credit report daily and informs you by email if there are any big changes detected, such as a new account being opened, change in address or employment, a reported delinquency, or if an inquiry has been made. Monitoring helps users keep an eye out for identity theft.

Credit Sense differs from other credit score services by pulling your credit profile from TransUnion, one of the three major credit reporting bureaus, and uses VantageScore 3.0, a credit scoring model developed collaboratively by the three major credit bureaus: Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion.

No. Credit Sense is free to PA Central Members. No credit card information is required to register.

There are five major categories that make up a credit score:

40% Payment History
Essentially what lenders want to know is whether or not you’re good about paying your loans on time.

23% Credit Usage
Credit usage, also known as credit utilization, is the ratio between the total balance you owe and your total credit limit on your revolving accounts. It is best to keep your credit usage below 30%.

21% Credit Age
The age of your oldest account, the age of your newest account, the average age of your accounts, and whether you’ve used an account recently are all factors related to the length of your credit history. In general, the longer your credit history the better.

11% Mix of Credit
Your score also takes into consideration how many total accounts you have and what types of credit you have. Your score will likely be higher if you have experience with different kinds of credit, like mortgages and installment student loans and revolving accounts like credit cards.

5% Recent Credit
Opening multiple credit accounts in a short period of time could represent a greater risk for lenders – those who see that you have multiple recent inquiries may worry that you are applying to so many places because you are unable to qualify for credit – or because you need money in a pinch.

There are several ways to improve your credit score. But it’s much more important to focus on improving what’s in your credit report rather than obsessing over your credit score.

Here is some general advice:

• Pay your bills on time. How promptly you pay your bills has the strongest influence on your credit score.
• Apply for credit only when you need it. Do not open too many accounts too frequently. And avoid opening multiple accounts within a short time span.
• Keep your outstanding balances low. A good rule of thumb? Keep balances below 30 percent of the credit limit on each of your revolving accounts.
• Reduce your total debt. It is not necessarily bad to owe some money. But it is not good to owe too much money. Consider paying down some of your outstanding loans.
• Build up a credit history. Maintaining a timely payment history for a mix of accounts (e.g.credit cards, auto, mortgage) over a longer period can improve your score.

As long as you are a regular online banking user, your credit score will be updated every month and displayed in your online banking screen or on your mobile app. You can click “refresh score” as frequently as every day by navigating to the detailed Credit Sense site from within online banking or our Mobile App.

No. Checking Credit Sense is a “soft inquiry”, which does not affect your credit score. Lenders use “hard inquiries” to make decisions about your credit worthiness when you apply for loans.