A recent post on The Consumerist gives a method for canceling a credit card that won’t hurt your credit score.
This is something I’ve been interested in doing for some time because I have old credit cards still being reported on my credit report that I closed years ago.
Here are the steps The Consumerist offers:
Step 1. Pay off the card in full.
Step 2. Call Customer Service to make sure the balance is really zero.
Step 3. Once the balance is zero, cancel the account over the phone.
Step 4: Follow up in writing and ask for written confirmation that the account is closed.
Step 5: Wait awhile, then check your credit report to make sure the account is really closed.
Check the post for additional details on these steps. This is important because The Consumerist post also states:
To close card accounts without impacting one's credit score, you need to only have zero balances on your credit report for all of your active credit cards. That's because if you have zero balances your credit utilization rate is therefore zero, and you can't raise it – and potentially hurt your score – by closing one or more of the active card accounts.
Darn. It will be a while before I have zero balances on all my credit cards.
