Lowering your debt utilization ratio is the quickest way to raise your credit score. Debt Utilization Ratio (DUR) refers to the gap between your credit limit and your actual balance. For those who have an immediate need to see their credit score increase you can try one or both of the following approaches.
Lower Your Credit Card Balances This is perhaps the quickest, easiest and less confusing way for most people. Multiply your credit card limit by 20%. Then pay the necessary amount to your credit card issuer to ensure your balance is below that number.
For example, if your credit limit is $3,000, your balance will need to be lowered to $600 to be at the 20% threshold ($3,000 x 20% = $600).
Another approach would be to increase the credit limit. Of course, the credit issuer will have to approve this request for an increase. Using the same example, if your credit card issuer agreed to increase your credit limit from $3,000 to $5,000 it would not be necessary to pay an additional amount since your balance is already at the 20% threshold ($5,000 x 20% = $1,000).
Redistribute Your Debt If you have more than one credit card you can redistribute your credit balances rather than using money to pay the balances down.
For example, if you have two credit cards and both have a $2,000 limit. One card is maxed out, while another card has a balance of zero. In this scenario, your maximum debt utilization rate would be 100%. However, if you redistributed the debt placing half on one card and half on the other card your maximum debt utilization ratio would be 50% thereby causing an increase in your score.