Building credit has a few similarities to sports (after all, it’s called your credit ‘score’ for a reason). Like all sports, when checking your score, you’ll notice it deals in points. Also as in sports, sometimes you’re up and sometimes you’re down. Unlike sports played for fun, however, if you look up at the board and see your “team” getting shellacked, you can’t just pick up the ball and go home. There’s no ‘mercy’ in this particular game; you can never stop playing—the game simply goes on without you.
Happy to relate, this full-contact lifelong sport, while tough, also has rules. One of the cardinal rules, if you want to build your credit, is to avoid credit card debt. Here are five important things to know if one (or more) of your credit card payments somehow gets “intercepted” on the way to its intended target:
Made a mistake? Keep playing—it’s a long game. Any good personal finance blog will tell you it’s important to get your free credit score, but it’s also important not to fixate on the day-to-day number or beat yourself up for being human. In fact, unless your payment comes in a full 30 days behind, it cannot be reported to the credit bureaus and thus won’t appear on your credit score. If you’re one or two months late, one time, then the damage should be minimal. When striving for credit improvement, the most important thing is establishing solid fundamentals. If you’ve missed a payment don’t panic but make a point not to repeat the mistake. Building credit is about demonstrating your payment discipline to lenders over time. If possible, setting up automatic payments is a good way to avoid human error. If not, find an effective means of reminding yourself what’s due to whom and when.
Once my payment is officially late, what happens? After 30 days, your creditor will do the following: First, likely charge a late fee (often in the $15-35 range). These fees continue each month payment is overdue. Second, they’ll report your late payment(s) to the three credit bureaus which record that fact on your credit report where it stays for seven years. This then results in a lowering of your credit score. Third, after a full 60 days delinquency, your interest rate can be raised, which increases the burden of your balance. With your balances growing and with payment history accounting for 35% of your credit score, you can see the dangers posed by missing payments.
The collateral damage isn’t quite as bad as it used to be. The Credit Card Accountability, Responsibility and Disclosure Act of 2009 (CARD Act) banned what’s known as “universal default”. Before 2009, Credit Card ‘X’ could hike your interest rate if you were late in paying Credit Card ‘Y’. To return to the metaphor, universal default was similar to a coach making the whole team run wind-sprints to punish them collectively for the mistakes of a single guy. Thankfully, this is no longer allowed, which helps mitigate the consequences of a good-faith error or a lapse in payment.
If you’ve made a mistake or two, you may be forgiven. If you’re a repeat-offender, this tip probably won’t be of much utility. However, if you’ve legitimately missed just one or two deadlines over a long business relationship, politely asking for some understanding from your creditor may result in the waiving of fees or other penalties. It’s certainly worth a try. Remember: you’re still the customer even if you’re not always right.
Stay in touch with creditors and pay them ASAP. When you miss a payment or fall further behind on your balance, don’t compound your errors by running from the problem. As stated before, the credit score game goes on, whether or not you’re playing. Ignoring the problem won’t make it go away. You may be able to minimize damage and harassment by turning the tables and calling creditors first. Explain your situation to them and resolve to make the payment as fast as you can.
Don’t throw good money after bad simply because you feel overwhelmed or intimidated by answering your phone. Instead, proactively work on building credit, checking your credit score regularly, and dealing with problems you encounter along the way. Do those simple things and you can focus on a much more enjoyable game: the one on TV.
Five Things to Know If You Miss a Credit Card Payment was originally featured on Quizzle Wire
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