How to improve your AECB credit score

To improve your Etihad Credit Bureau (AECB) credit score, change what the bureau measures: pay every instalment and bill on time, use less of your card limits, keep cheques covered and apply for new credit only when you need it. Your full credit report names the key factors affecting your own score, with the bureau’s recommendations. No one can promise a set increase or a date.

Key takeaways

• The bureau names six score factors: limit use, recent credit use, recent applications, paying on time, late payment history and cheque record.
• The full credit report, not the score alone, shows the factors affecting your score and the bureau's recommendations.
• Settling a debt does not erase it: defaults, missed payments and bounced cheques stay on the report for up to 5 years.
• The bureau publishes no timeline for how fast a score rises; banks send it data daily and other providers monthly.
• Buy now, pay later plans do not raise or lower the score under the current model, but they appear on your report.

Your score is built from records that banks, finance companies, telecom and utility providers and other sources send to the bureau. The only ways you can change it are to change those records over time, or to correct them where they are wrong. What the numbers themselves mean is covered in what a good AECB score is, and if you are new to the UAE with no record yet, start with no credit history in the UAE.

What the AECB score measures

The score measures how you have used and repaid credit, through six factors that the bureau names on its credit score page. The bureau does not publish how much weight each factor carries, so no one outside it can tell you which change is worth the most.

The six factors the bureau names

What the bureau’s FAQ adds

In its FAQ answer to “What factors impact my credit score?”, listed under tenant screening, the bureau also names length of credit history, credit mix and outstanding balances. Its credit score page describes the current model, Credit Score 3i, as looking beyond a single moment in time.

How far back Credit Score 3i looks

Up to 36 months

Credit Score 3i uses up to 36 months of trended credit information and gives greater consideration to how credit obligations are managed over time.

So the pattern across months counts, not only where your accounts stand on the day the score is produced. Under Credit Score 3i you get either a Mature Score or a New-to-Credit Score, depending on how much history you have; the ranges are explained in the good-score guide linked above.

Start with your own credit report

Buy the full credit report rather than the score alone before you change anything. Only the report shows the key factors affecting your own score, together with the bureau’s recommendations for improving it.

Where the bureau's advice for you appears

In the full report

The bureau's answer to how to improve a credit score is that a purchased credit report shows the key score factors affecting your score, along with the bureau's recommendations to improve it.

The score on its own costs AED 10.50 and shows only the number. The full report adds payment history, credit accounts, credit inquiries, legal records, recommendations and score factors:

Full credit report, score included

AED 84

A personal credit report from the Etihad Credit Bureau costs AED 84 including VAT, and includes the credit score.

The report also shows your Income Utilisation Ratio (IUR), which matters for the card decisions further down. The buying steps are in how to check your AECB score and report, and what each section means is in how to read your AECB credit report.

Then check every entry before you work on habits. Is each account yours? Do closed cards show as closed? Was each late payment really late? Wrong or missing data can be corrected; accurate data cannot.

Correcting wrong data

Free

Data correction is free for any credit report bought in the last 30 days; the bureau passes the request to the information provider, and the report should be updated within 10 working days.

The lender that reported an error also has its own deadline under Central Bank rules.

Lender's deadline to fix its errors

7 business days

A licensed institution must correct errors in the data it reported to the credit bureau within 7 complete business days of becoming aware of them.

Because a free correction depends on a report bought in the last 30 days, read the report as soon as it arrives. If the provider rejects your correction request, the bureau lets you register a data correction dispute through its contact centre. If a lender does not fix its own error, you can also complain to the bank and then to Sanadak.

Habits that match the bureau’s factors

Each habit below lines up with one of the six factors. The bureau’s own list is short: in its tenant screening FAQ, in an answer about the Tenant Score, it says you can improve your score by paying obligations on time, keeping credit utilisation low, avoiding cheque returns and keeping a stable credit history. None of these comes with a number of points or a deadline.

Pay every instalment and bill on time

Paying on time is the subject of two of the six factors, payment behaviour and payment history, and the report shows each month of each facility in a colour grid.

Payment history on your report

Red = over 90 days late

Each facility on the report shows a 24-month colour grid: green for paid on or before the due date, yellow for paid up to 90 days late, red for paid more than 90 days late.

Under that grid, a payment made even a few days after the due date falls in the yellow band, not the green one. Bills count on the report too: it includes your payment history with telecom operators and water and electricity providers, alongside your loans and cards. The bureau does not say how much bills weigh in the score, but they sit on the same report that lenders read.

The simplest protection is mechanical. An automatic payment from your salary account for each instalment and card, timed after your salary arrives, removes the risk of forgetting a date.

Use less of your credit limits

Credit utilisation is how much of your credit limits you use. In plain terms, AED 6,000 owed on cards with AED 20,000 of limits means 30% is in use; paying it down to AED 2,000 makes it 10%. The bureau does not publish its formula or a target share, such as a percentage to stay under.

A higher limit lowers the share in use on paper, but a bank cannot raise your card limit automatically. Central Bank standards require a new check with the credit bureau and your express consent before any increase. A higher limit also raises your IUR, which counts 5% of every active card limit, as the worked example below shows.

Keep cheques covered

Cheque behaviour, your record of honoured and returned cheques, is one of the six factors, and returned cheques are listed on the report. A returned cheque stays there for up to 5 years, even after you pay the amount. A post-dated cheque, such as a rent cheque, can be presented from the date written on it, so the money needs to be in the account by then. The legal side is covered in bounced cheques in the UAE.

Apply for new credit only when you need it

Your recent activity in applying for new credit is one of the six factors. The bureau does not say how many applications count against you, or for how long. What you control is how often you apply: checking first whether you meet a lender’s requirements avoids applications with little chance of success. See personal loan eligibility or the minimum salary for a credit card.

Keep a steady record over time

Length of credit history and credit mix are factors the bureau names in its FAQ, and its tenant screening answer lists a stable credit history among the habits that help. Because Credit Score 3i uses up to 36 months of trended data, a steady record builds over months and years, not weeks. If you are new to the UAE and start with little or no record, see building a score as a new resident.

Does clearing your credit card improve your score?

It can help. Credit utilisation and outstanding balances are both factors the bureau names, so a lower balance works in your favour. The bureau does not say by how much, and it says a score change should not automatically be put down to a single credit facility or event, because the score reflects your whole credit profile.

Paying the balance in full

Paying the full statement balance by the due date does two things: it lowers the balance your bank reports, and it stops interest. Under the Central Bank’s Consumer Protection Standards, a bank must not charge interest on a card balance, cash advances excluded, when the statement balance is paid in full by the due date. After a part payment, interest runs on the outstanding balance from the due date until it is paid.

The bureau says banks send it updated data daily, so a lower balance reaches your file once your bank reports it. How each card charge works is explained in credit card interest and fees.

Closing a card you do not use

Closing an unused card lowers your IUR, because the IUR counts 5% of the limit of every active card even if you never use it. Its effect on the score is less clear. The bureau says factors that affect the IUR can affect the score, but it also names length of credit history and credit mix as factors, and it does not say how closing a card moves the score.

Income Utilisation Ratio: card limits

5% of card limits

The bureau's Income Utilisation Ratio counts 5% of the credit limit of every active credit card as a monthly payment, alongside loan instalments and last month's telecom and utility dues, against your last reported income.

Worked example

Closing an unused AED 30,000 card on an AED 15,000 salary

All amounts are illustrations. The IUR is measured against your last reported income.

1. Loan instalment: AED 2,000 a month.
2. Two active cards counted at 5% of their limits: AED 20,000 × 5% = AED 1,000, and AED 30,000 × 5% = AED 1,500.
3. Last month’s phone and utility bills: AED 500.
4. Before: AED 2,000 + AED 1,000 + AED 1,500 + AED 500 = AED 5,000, and AED 5,000 ÷ AED 15,000 = 33.3%.
5. After closing the unused AED 30,000 card: AED 2,000 + AED 1,000 + AED 500 = AED 3,500, and AED 3,500 ÷ AED 15,000 = 23.3%.

Closing the unused card lowers this IUR from 33.3% to 23.3%; the bureau does not say how a change in the IUR moves the score.

Closing a card can also push a different measure the other way. Suppose the same person owes AED 4,000 on the AED 20,000 card they keep:

The share in use is AED 4,000 ÷ AED 50,000 = 8% before and AED 4,000 ÷ AED 20,000 = 20% after. One measure falls, the other rises, and the bureau publishes no rule for weighing the two. Before you cancel, read closing a credit card properly, and afterwards check that the report shows the card as closed: a card still shown as active keeps counting in the IUR.

What will not help

Settling a debt does not erase its history:

How long negative records stay

Up to 5 years

Defaults, missed payments and bounced cheques stay on the credit report for up to 5 years, even after the amount is settled.

The bureau’s data correction service is for wrong or missing information. A late payment that was reported correctly stays, even after you pay. Paying still matters, because a settled account stops adding new late months to the grid. Be wary of anyone who offers to delete accurate negative entries or to raise your score by a set number of points: corrections go through the provider that reported the data, and only for data that is wrong or missing.

Buy now, pay later plans do not build a score either.

Buy now, pay later and your score

Not in score

Under the current credit score model, buy now, pay later (BNPL) reporting does not affect the credit score, but BNPL contracts appear on the credit report and may be considered by lenders who review it.

See how buy now, pay later shows on your report and what happens if you miss a BNPL payment. Opening new cards or loans only to build a record also adds to your recent activity in applying for new credit, which is one of the six factors.

How long it takes

The bureau gives no timeline for how fast a score rises, and it publishes no figure for how much any one month of good payments adds. What it does state is how often data arrives and how long records stay.

How often the bureau gets new data

Daily; monthly for non-banks

Information providers submit updated data to the Etihad Credit Bureau daily; providers outside the banking sector submit it monthly.

Read together, these say that a lower card balance can reach the bureau with your bank’s next daily update and a paid phone or utility bill with that provider’s next monthly one, while a record of on-time payments builds month by month and an accurate late payment stays visible for years. Any promise of a set rise within a set number of months goes beyond what the bureau itself says.

Your score is not your borrowing limit

A better score can help, but it does not decide how much you can borrow. The bureau plays no role in reviewing or approving applications: lenders decide under their own policies and may weigh the score together with other information. The Central Bank also caps your total monthly loan and card repayments to banks and finance companies.

Maximum debt burden ratio

50%

Monthly deductions for all loans and facilities from banks and finance companies together, including car loans, home loans, overdrafts and credit cards, must not exceed 50% of the borrower's gross salary and any regular income from a defined and specific source, at any time.

The two ratios are easy to confuse. The debt burden ratio is the Central Bank cap that a lender applies to your repayments, card repayments included. The IUR is the bureau’s own measure on your report, and it counts 5% of every active card limit whether or not you use the card. How the cap limits a new loan is shown in how much personal loan you can get.

If you are already behind on payments

Contact the lender in writing before the next due date. Central Bank standards require lenders to offer qualified credit counselling and to give reasonable consideration to alternative arrangements when you approach them.

Instalment deferrals

2 a year

Banks may defer up to two instalments in a year, at their discretion.

A deferral is the bank’s choice, not a right. If you agree a revised arrangement, the lender must confirm it in writing and tell you that reporting on your arrears is shared with the credit bureau, so an arrangement does not keep missed payments off your report.

Written terms for a revised arrangement

10 business days

When a lender agrees a revised repayment arrangement with a consumer, it must give the consumer, within 10 complete business days, a written explanation of the arrangement, a revised payment schedule and a breakdown of how payments will be allocated, and must tell the consumer that reporting on the arrears is shared with the credit bureau.

What happens after missed payments covers late fees, collections and the timeline. If you owe several lenders, see debt consolidation options and negotiating with your bank. For a card balance, the payoff calculator shows how long it takes to clear at the monthly amount you can pay.

For the rest of the topic, browse our credit score guides.