topic Re: American Express - payments/closing date/utilization in Credit Cards

American Express - payments/closing date/utilization

Pony4her — Sat, 12 Jun 2021 03:46:59 GMT

Hi all - New here. I have an American Express Delta SkyMiles® Gold Card, just to confirm, I should make my monthly payment before the account statement closing date, correct? Trying to reduce my utilization. Thanks in advance for responding.

Re: American Express - payments/closing date/utilization

ChargedUp — Sat, 12 Jun 2021 03:47:16 GMT

@Pony4her wrote:
Hi all - New here. I have an American Express Delta SkyMiles® Gold Card, just to confirm, I should make my monthly payment before the account statement closing date, correct? Trying to reduce my utilization. Thanks in advance for responding.

If you're paying your entire balance and want Amex to report your balance as zero, then yes... Make the payment before the statement cut date.

If you pay less than the full balance, your lower balance will be reported but you will still owe a payment after the statement cuts.

Re: American Express - payments/closing date/utilization

Red1Blue — Sat, 12 Jun 2021 03:47:34 GMT

From what I know if the $0 balance on the account Amex might not update immeadietly. Not sure why. Others might have a different opinion and experience. You might want to keep a small balance on the account so you can they will be forced to report the new low balance.

Re: American Express - payments/closing date/utilization

Pony4her — Sat, 12 Jun 2021 03:51:56 GMT

Thanks for responding. I plan to make a $500 payment on a balance of $1433. Currently, I'm trying to reduce my DTI as I'm preparing for a mortgage loan, new build. I would like to ensure my scores continue to build and not become stagnant since it'll take 6-9 months to build our home. Should I follow AZEO now or just continue to pay down and then AZEO a month before the final mortgage credit pull?

Am Ex $1433/2100

Cap 1 $74/500

Cap 1 $156/1000

Lowes $533/2500

current scores 690-642-745

Re: American Express - payments/closing date/utilization

Red1Blue — Sat, 12 Jun 2021 04:12:18 GMT

@Pony4her wrote:
Thanks for responding. I plan to make a $500 payment on a balance of $1433. Currently, I'm trying to reduce my DTI as I'm preparing for a mortgage loan, new build. I would like to ensure my scores continue to build and not become stagnant since it'll take 6-9 months to build our home. Should I follow AZEO now or just continue to pay down and then AZEO a month before the final mortgage credit pull?

Am Ex $1433/2100
Cap 1 $74/500
Cap 1 $156/1000
Lowes $533/2500

current scores 690-642-745

I'll let others chime in. I think 2 months of AZEO should be enough before you apply for the loan. Also keep in mind there is no reason to pay interest on the cards if you can afford to pay to pay it in full and avoid the interest.

Re: American Express - payments/closing date/utilization

Pony4her — Sat, 12 Jun 2021 04:12:35 GMT

Current home on market now, need to move forward with pre-approval so we can put down contract on new construction. My DTI is 38%, paying down the Am Ex by $500, and the others will lower the DTI to 33%, however, I also want to continue to boost the scores through my build time. Such stress, lol. Will pay them off and follow AZEO while building. Thank you.

Re: American Express - payments/closing date/utilization

Red1Blue — Sat, 12 Jun 2021 04:12:52 GMT

@Pony4her wrote:
Current home on market now, need to move forward with pre-approval so we can put down contract on new construction. My DTI is 38%, paying down the Am Ex by $500, and the others will lower the DTI to 33%, however, I also want to continue to boost the scores through my build time. Such stress, lol. Will pay them off and follow AZEO while building. Thank you.

If that is the case, you can always call Amex and request them to update the balance to $0. I am sure Amex would be happy to do that and also they have ability to update the report if they choose to do so. Also you can dispute the balance with CR and have the update the balance to $0. Or you can always show the paid recepit to Mortage recepit to the Lender and show them it is paid. There are many options. I think the Mortgage section on the Fico forums might be best place to discuss the strategies.

Re: American Express - payments/closing date/utilization

Anonymous — Sat, 12 Jun 2021 14:42:45 GMT

Find out the date the card (all your cards) report (to bureaus), not statement date or due date. It could be before or after a statement/due date. (call AMEX, they will tell you the report date)

Make payments a few days before and it will always report the balance when you paid it.

Re: American Express - payments/closing date/utilization

Pony4her — Sat, 12 Jun 2021 15:21:02 GMT

Will definitely do this. Thank you

Re: American Express - payments/closing date/utilization

PackAttack07 — Sun, 13 Jun 2021 15:24:28 GMT

I've read several posts about AMEX not updating balances to bureaus regularly and particularly at $0 statement end balance but that hasn't been my experience. AMEX has always historically updated balances on credit cards within a couple days of statement end date for me. There is no reason to keep a balance to get AMEX to report since they will do it anyway, particularly if your goal is better stores/DTI, certainly if it's a credit card. The exception is if that is your only non-zero balance.

You would get penalized scoring-wise for having an additional account with a balance, and the minimum payment on even just $25 in balance is going to $25 that's going to (very marginally) lower your DTI.

If you need to get AMEX to report an updated balance to the bureaus mid-cycle, you can do that easily. I did it Friday afternoon and Experian was updated the next day, TransUnion 2 days later (but showed 6/11 as-of date so could just be WalletHub being delayed.

AMEX Credit Bureau Team:

(800) 874-2712

9am-5:30pm EST M-F

Select the option about "credit inquiries" (option 1) to get to a person, otherwise if you just hold you'll get kicked back to customer support and they'll have to retransfer you.

The one thing I CAN say is that AMEX has not been giving me PDF statements when I pay off my cards before the statement date (as I usually do). That is the case even when I had a balance report on the prior statement and paid it during that statement. But the balance was still $0 so not sure why it would even matter if they updated or not - I have never heard of and do not believe that AMEX would just randomly report a non-statement ending balance unless you ask them to.

Re: American Express - payments/closing date/utilization

Pony4her — Mon, 14 Jun 2021 01:28:46 GMT

You are correct, there is just a few date difference, I called and they confirmed that my due date is 6/21 and my closing date is 6/25. Will contact the number above tomorrow. Thanks guys

Re: American Express - payments/closing date/utilization

Anonymous — Mon, 14 Jun 2021 00:02:22 GMT

@Pony4her wrote:
You are correct, there is just a few date difference, I called and they confirmed that my due date is 6/21 and my closing date is 6/25. With this being said, when would you recommend I pay them? Which date?

Neither. The date the card reports to the bureaus.

not the two dates they gave you.

usually the report date is before statement close date. Ask for "the report date".

Re: American Express - payments/closing date/utilization

Pony4her — Mon, 14 Jun 2021 13:40:25 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
@Pony4her wrote:
You are correct, there is just a few date difference, I called and they confirmed that my due date is 6/21 and my closing date is 6/25. With this being said, when would you recommend I pay them? Which date?
Neither. The date the card reports to the bureaus.

not the two dates they gave you.

usually the report date is before statement close date. Ask for "the report date".

Just called and they report on statement close date. Last reported on 5/27, which is also what is listed on Credi Karma; she stated next report will be 6/27 or 6/28. My due date is 6/21, should I just pay the amount due on 6/21 which is $60 and larger payment of $500 towards balance before the 27th or can I just pay the $560 on the 21st?

@Anonymous @PackAttack07

Re: American Express - payments/closing date/utilization

Anonymous — Mon, 14 Jun 2021 14:00:03 GMT

Edit (saw ur details on first post)

i have 5 AMEX and the report dates are all (except 1) before statement close date. And dates that show changes on credit reports are usually 2-5 days after the report dates.

Amex Pay the 560 before 6/21 if you can, puts you to about 41%. Need to pay another 300 to hit that 27% threshold.

Re: American Express - payments/closing date/utilization

Anonymous — Mon, 14 Jun 2021 14:32:24 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
@Pony4her wrote:
You are correct, there is just a few date difference, I called and they confirmed that my due date is 6/21 and my closing date is 6/25. With this being said, when would you recommend I pay them? Which date?
Neither. The date the card reports to the bureaus.

not the two dates they gave you.

usually the report date is before statement close date. Ask for "the report date".

@Anonymous With the exception of US Bank/Elan Financial and a few other outliers, all lenders report balances to the credit bureaus at midnight Pacific Time of the statement close date. For American Express, the statement close date is the same as the reporting date; although the credit bureau will take a few days to update the information. Amex definitely does not report before the statement close date.

Re: American Express - payments/closing date/utilization

Anonymous — Mon, 14 Jun 2021 14:33:32 GMT

interesting. My data is different. Looking at one of my Amex for last month, I have a report date of 17th, statement close on 19, and (depending on delay) reports are changing on the 21, 22, 23rd (trans/exper/equi).

They could report to bureaus earlier, but they aren't posted/dated until those days.

my Amex gold statement and report are both on the 3rd with reports updating as early as the 10th (last month anyway).

Re: American Express - payments/closing date/utilization

Pony4her — Mon, 14 Jun 2021 15:01:30 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
Edit (saw ur details on first post)

i have 5 AMEX and the report dates are all (except 1) before statement close date. And dates that show changes on credit reports are usually 2-5 days after the report dates.

Amex Pay the 560 before 6/21 if you can, puts you to about 41%. Need to pay another 300 to hit that 27% threshold.

Thank you. Will do, will pay it today. Yep, the close date is the reporting date with them; now I know I will just dump it all today which is a few days before the due date.