Tuesday, June 05, 2007

5 Small Mistakes That Cause Big Damage To A Person's Credit History

Credit history and credit score if good can get us good loans and credit cards at better terms. We make a lot of efforts to remain in good books of credit rating agencies. But little things such as those listed in this article if not taken care can do serious damage to a person's credit history. Make sure you don't make these mistakes.

1. Not checking credit reports for wrong credit card charges can land you in serious trouble, and adversely affect your credit score. All this for only a simple fault that you didn't keep track of your expenses, false charges increased your monthly credit card bills, which you weren't able to repay and got a negative mark in credit report. Isn't that silly?

2. Procrastination, while paying bills ensures negative remarks in credit history. It's the credit cards with big outstanding balances which will hurt you the most in terms of interest rates, and if you keep on paying for credit cards with low balances and ignoring the bigger ones, you are doomed.

3. On a big buying spree you exhaust your credit card limits and max out. What will it do to your credit report? Simple, you will get a negative remark. Try spending less than 30% of your credit card limit and, it will keep you in good books of credit rating agencies. Go overboard, and there are penalties to be paid.

4. When you stay with a credit card for long and keep the accounts in good health it helps a lot in terms of building good credit history. Don't ever cancel that credit card, it will wipe out all the goodness. Remember old is gold. Cancelling new credit cards doesn't hurt much on credit history but doing that to an old credit card will invite a backlash.

5. Using a personal credit card for business expenses or vice versa will do no good for both cases. A business credit card will build business credit history and a personal credit card will help for personal credit history. Keeping these expenses different will ensure that right card builds the right credit history. Mixing up things will only increase the credit card debt without helping the cause.
Credit history and credit score if good can get us good loans and credit cards at better terms. We make a lot of efforts to remain in good books of credit rating agencies. But little things such as those listed in this article if not taken care can do serious damage to a person's credit history. Make sure you don't make these mistakes.

1. Not checking credit reports for wrong credit card charges can land you in serious trouble, and adversely affect your credit score. All this for only a simple fault that you didn't keep track of your expenses, false charges increased your monthly credit card bills, which you weren't able to repay and got a negative mark in credit report. Isn't that silly?

2. Procrastination, while paying bills ensures negative remarks in credit history. It's the credit cards with big outstanding balances which will hurt you the most in terms of interest rates, and if you keep on paying for credit cards with low balances and ignoring the bigger ones, you are doomed.

3. On a big buying spree you exhaust your credit card limits and max out. What will it do to your credit report? Simple, you will get a negative remark. Try spending less than 30% of your credit card limit and, it will keep you in good books of credit rating agencies. Go overboard, and there are penalties to be paid.

4. When you stay with a credit card for long and keep the accounts in good health it helps a lot in terms of building good credit history. Don't ever cancel that credit card, it will wipe out all the goodness. Remember old is gold. Cancelling new credit cards doesn't hurt much on credit history but doing that to an old credit card will invite a backlash.

5. Using a personal credit card for business expenses or vice versa will do no good for both cases. A business credit card will build business credit history and a personal credit card will help for personal credit history. Keeping these expenses different will ensure that right card builds the right credit history. Mixing up things will only increase the credit card debt without helping the cause.