Author: Greg Fisher

Adjust the start and end times of videos in a YouTube playlist

Video website YouTube now has an advanced feature that enables users to create playlists that do not play entire videos.  You can configure the in and out points of videos that you include in a playlist, and leave the other parts out.

In other words, a viewer can watch a sequence of segments of separate videos without doing anything, as the playlist automatically jumps from video segment to video segment.  After adding a video to a playlist, the playlist creator can adjust “the start and end times.”  There is a 15 second minimum length for each segment.

Here is an example of this function.  Employers do not use credit scores because they cannot even get them.  However, that fact doesn’t stop anybody from flap-yapping scary misinformation.  Today, there are 7 videos in this playlist.  It jumps right to the place in the video that is relevant, plays only the few seconds that are relevant, then jumps to the same in the next video.  Watch below, on this website, or watch on YouTube.com to see the videos play on the individual pages of the creators.  The creators of those videos are out of control and should take responsibility for their errors.  See the messages to some of them elsewhere on this website.

This situation has existed for years.  It is pathetic.

Newspaper monetization

From: Greg Fisher [mailto:greg@creditscoring.com]
Sent: Friday, April 19, 2013 11:39 AM
To: Strange Logic North America
Subject: Chronicle of a myth

You further a myth by writing, “To an employer, a bad credit score may be seen as a lack of responsibility or poor decision making skills and cause them to put up a stop sign for hiring.”

Meanwhile, the San Francisco Chronicle runs advertisements on that page containing that falsehood.

Name one employer who has ever used a credit score.  If you cannot, tell me what you are going to do to counteract the myth that you perpetuated.

What is your name?

—
Greg Fisher
The Credit Scoring Site
creditscoring.com
PO Box 342
Dayton, Ohio  45409-0342

PS. Extra points for promptness.  Act now.

 

Senior Vice President

From: Greg Fisher [mailto:greg@creditscoring.com]
Sent: Friday, April 19, 2013 9:52 AM
To: Jerry Healey, owner and publisher, Colorado Community Media
Cc: Todd Hauer, senior vice president, wealth advisor, Morgan Stanley
Subject: credit score, credit utilization definition

You published this about one of the five categories of data in the FICO credit score formula:

Credit utilization. Credit utilization is defined as the total debt you have divided by the total available credit that is available to you. High credit utilization can be a warning sign of credit risk.

Fair Isaac does not title the second category with those words.  It uses “Amounts owed,” and that category contains factors that have nothing to do with the proportion of balances to credit limits.

I noticed your article in a news search.  It is in the top ten results, alongside articles from Yahoo! News and Fox Business.

Who “defined” credit utilization?

What is your correction policy?

—
Greg Fisher
The Credit Scoring Site
creditscoring.com
PO Box 342
Dayton, Ohio  45409-0342

Editorial distribution

From: Greg Fisher [mailto:greg@creditscoring.com]
Sent: Thursday, April 11, 2013 8:33 AM
To: Arthur Sulzberger, Jr., publisher, New York Times
Subject: credit score, distribution, New York Times

See this message and your response at https://blog.creditscoring.com/?p=4723.

In an editorial, you published, “But the proportion of people with poor ratings — credit scores under 600 — has grown from about 15 percent in the years before the recession to about 25 percent in 2011.”

According to Fair Isaac, in its FICO 8 credit score model, from 2005 to 2011, the percentage of those under 600 [alternate link, added 2014-02-13] was never lower than 23.

What is the name of the person who wrote that editorial?

—
Greg Fisher
The Credit Scoring Site
creditscoring.com
PO Box 342
Dayton, Ohio  45409-0342

Acknowledgement

Here is a list of steps to attempt to get the attention of people who misinform citizens.

1. Email
2. Social media message
3. Postcard
4. Letter
5. Certified letter, return reciept requested
6. Visit, in-person, whistle stop

Further steps (if necessary) might include cash, merciless berating and singing telegrams.

From: Greg Fisher [mailto:greg@creditscoring.com]
Sent: Wednesday, March 27, 2013 2:50 PM
To: José Quiñonez, executive director, Mission Asset Fund, and chairperson, Consumer Advisory Board, U.S. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau
Subject: The right thing

You wrote: “Experian, a major credit reporting agencies[SIC], estimates that 66 million Americans are unscoreable[SIC]—they do not have enough credit history to generate a credit score. And without a credit score, they can’t get loans to buy cars, start businesses, get mortgages, rent apartments, or even get jobs.”

However, Experian also states, “Employers never get a credit score.”

So, where did you get the idea that employers use credit scores?

—
Greg Fisher
The Credit Scoring Site
creditscoring.com
PO Box 342
Dayton, Ohio  45409-0342

Greece

Earlier this month, credit score company Fair Isaac promoted a social media message by a woman in Greece who claims, inaccurately, that employers use credit scores.

Employers do not use credit scores.

In her story, which is dated 2010, the writer states, inaccurately:

One area which may be controversial for a fico score to be considered is when they are used by potential employers. Some positions are dependent on a good score, and not measuring up could end up costing you the job you want. Again they are used to assess your reliability and can indicate how responsible you are.

In 2010 news agency Reuters furthered the employers-use-credit-scores myth when it interviewed the Fair Isaac CEO and reported, “FICO officially frowns on the fact that employers, landlords, and the like obtain access to individuals’ credit scores and use those scores as a proxy for that person’s general moral upstandingness.”

Prior to that article, regarding its information about credit scores and employment, Fair Isaac responded to creditscoring.com that it used “anecdotal information gleaned from public sources such as published articles.”

Reuters has not made a correction.

Unicameral

In planning another whistle stop trip, the train to Lincoln (California Zephyr) seems feasible.  But terminating in the capital and bypassing Nebraska’s nearby major city means foregoing another opportunity to experience what appears to be a majestic large public space in Omaha, the Union Passenger Terminal Great Hall.

photograph, Union Passenger Terminal, Omaha
Union Passenger Terminal, Omaha

The manager of the Lincoln Marriott, however, makes staying in the capital city, at least, a comfortable choice (assuming the senator does not reply).

Getting to North Platte?  That’s another story.

From: Greg Fisher [mailto:greg@creditscoring.com]
Sent: Thursday, February 21, 2013 1:09 PM
To: Annette Dubas, state senator, Nebraska
Subject: credit score, employers, Nebraska Unicameral Legislature

A report quotes you saying, “The use of a credit score in job applications has an especially negative impact on women, the disabled, and certain populations such as Hispanic and African Americans because their scores tend to be lower.”

Employers do not use credit scores.

What will you do to correct the record?

—
Greg Fisher
The Credit Scoring Site
creditscoring.com
PO Box 342
Dayton, Ohio  45409-0342

Nebraska State Capitol building
Nebraska State Capitol

Bad reporting at the Washington Post

From: Greg Fisher [mailto:greg@creditscoring.com]
Sent: Wednesday, February 13, 2013 11:44 AM
To: Michelle Singletary, columnist, Washington Post
Subject: Your bad reporting

See this message and your response (or lack of it) at https://blog.creditscoring.com/?tag=washington-post-company.

You wrote, “The information is then used to create credit scores, which can affect consumers’ ability to get a credit card, a home loan, an apartment or even a job.”

Employers do not use credit scores, and you failed to substantiate your claim.  Did you just make it up?

Who is your source?

—
Greg Fisher
The Credit Scoring Site
creditscoring.com
PO Box 342
Dayton, Ohio  45409-0342

30, 30

From: Greg Fisher [mailto:greg@creditscoring.com]
Sent: Friday, February 08, 2013 4:08 PM
To: John Branham, public relations and social media manager, TransUnion Interactive, TransUnion
Subject: 30, 30

See this message and your response at https://blog.creditscoring.com/?p=4657.

Your press release states, “A history of late payments – even by a few days – can potentially harm your credit score.”

However, according your key, an adverse rating only begins at 30 days.  By “a few days,” do you mean a month?  And, couldn’t just one late payment harm a score?

Also, what is so healthy about keeping balances “at or below 30 percent” of a person’s total available credit?  Did you poll lenders?

Finally, what are you doing about the inaccurate USA Today report?

—
Greg Fisher
The Credit Scoring Site
creditscoring.com
PO Box 342
Dayton, Ohio  45409-0342

 

Prediction: USA Today publisher Gannett will make a correction

USA Today publisher Gannett will make a correction to its latest story about credit scores.  You can believe that prediction because it isn’t easy to get around fundamental numbers.

USA Today claims that the VantageScore credit score scale is 501 to 999 when it is actually 501-990.

But, McPaper is in good company. Testifying before the U.S. House of Representatives, VantageScore chief Barrett Burns committed the same error twice, according to the official record.  VantageScore’s account of history is peculiarly different.

Further, Gannett will make a correction because the company has never come to terms with its inaccurate story about employers and credit scores.  The newspaper’s response was to use the pathetic and annoying “Read the story again” strategy.  Its editorial department (fine people, all) is, thankfully, cooperative and much wiser.  Happy Groundhog Day, by the way.

The numbers journalists use to add credibility to their stories are the same ones that can come back to bite them.