topic Re: Dropping Cards in Credit Cards

Dropping Cards

Anonymous — Thu, 08 Jul 2021 20:02:55 GMT

Hello, total newbie here.

I was just wondering what you guys opinion is about dropping at least one of those high cost Credit Cards and the reason why?

I have a Platinum as well as a Business Platinum on top of the Chase Sapphire Reserve and Chase Business Plus.

With the increase in yearly fees should I drop some of them and which one would you keep?

I greatly appreciate all and every advise and thank you in advance!

Re: Dropping Cards

MrDisco99 — Thu, 08 Jul 2021 20:23:05 GMT

Only you can say if a card is worth keeping or not. Are you getting value from the card that offsets the fee? Card benefits have different values for different people and lifestyles.

Re: Dropping Cards

Anonymous — Thu, 08 Jul 2021 20:45:36 GMT

I agree with this. If the cards rewards aren't at minimum covering the annual fee I wouldn't see the point in having it. That's just me.

One thing you can do instead of closing is see if you can downgrade the cards (if available).

Re: Dropping Cards

SouthJamaica — Thu, 08 Jul 2021 21:42:56 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
Hello, total newbie here.
I was just wondering what you guys opinion is about dropping at least one of those high cost Credit Cards and the reason why?
I have a Platinum as well as a Business Platinum on top of the Chase Sapphire Reserve and Chase Business Plus.
With the increase in yearly fees should I drop some of them and which one would you keep?
I greatly appreciate all and every advise and thank you in advance!

I don't know what the Chase Business Plus is.

I don't consider the Chase Sapphire Reserve a "high cost" card, because the $300 travel credit immediately wipes out $300 of the $450 annual fee. To me the CSR seems to produce great value for its cost.

With the Amex platinum cards, it depends on whether you can really get sufficient value out of them, and whether you are more likely to use the personal card or the business card. I had the Amex Business Platinum, but didn't realize much value from it, so I dropped it. The annual fees are super high on these, so unless I had a real plan on how to get lots of value from them, I'd ditch them.

Re: Dropping Cards

Anonymous — Fri, 09 Jul 2021 00:44:31 GMT

Sorry, my bad. I meant Business Plus Ink.

Re: Dropping Cards

Anonymous — Fri, 09 Jul 2021 00:45:31 GMT

What does downgrade mean?

Re: Dropping Cards

Anonymous — Fri, 09 Jul 2021 01:36:14 GMT

If it isn't getting you value drop it, no sense in keeping it honestly and it stays on your credit for 10 years

Re: Dropping Cards

Anonymous — Fri, 09 Jul 2021 01:43:00 GMT

Thank you so much

Re: Dropping Cards

SouthJamaica — Fri, 09 Jul 2021 02:54:30 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
Sorry, my bad. I meant Business Plus Ink.

Well that card has no annual fee at all, so it's anything but a high cost card. And there's no down side to it.

I would love to have one of the cash back Ink cards some day, when Chase thinks me worthy.

Re: Dropping Cards

KLEXH25 — Fri, 09 Jul 2021 04:03:38 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
What does downgrade mean?

It means changing to a card with a lower Annual Fee within the same card family. So the Chase Sapphire Reserve can downgrade to the Sapphire Preferred. The Amex Platinum can be downgraded to the Gold or Green charge cards. So instead of closing your account, you can downgrade and still keep the original card's age/history and credit limit.

Re: Dropping Cards

MarkintheHV — Fri, 09 Jul 2021 13:16:12 GMT

What I did was to compute the age of all my cards, total the months opened, then divide by the amount of cards to get my average age. Then, I would remove the card from the mix, adjust the total months and divide by one less to see exactly what the impact was on my average age. I got rid of several less than desireable cards that way, and actually raised the average age of my accounts.

YMMV

Re: Dropping Cards

Remedios — Fri, 09 Jul 2021 14:19:56 GMT

@MarkintheHV wrote:
What I did was to compute the age of all my cards, total the months opened, then divide by the amount of cards to get my average age. Then, I would remove the card from the mix, adjust the total months and divide by one less to see exactly what the impact was on my average age. I got rid of several less than desireable cards that way, and actually raised the average age of my accounts.

YMMV

Well, you computed it wrong.

Closed cards are still included in AAoA calculations, and mileage doesn't vary on that.

Unless you somehow managed to remove card from your credit report, it's counting.

Re: Dropping Cards

Aim_High — Sat, 10 Jul 2021 01:48:15 GMT

@Remedios wrote:
@MarkintheHV wrote:
What I did was to compute the age of all my cards, total the months opened, then divide by the amount of cards to get my average age. Then, I would remove the card from the mix, adjust the total months and divide by one less to see exactly what the impact was on my average age. I got rid of several less than desireable cards that way, and actually raised the average age of my accounts.

YMMV
Well, you computed it wrong.
Closed cards are still included in AAoA calculations, and mileage doesn't vary on that.
Unless you somehow managed to remove card from your credit report, it's counting.

+1. The additional issue I have found is that there is no universal standard among lenders on how long a closed card will continue to report. When we have members considering the impact of a card closure, it's often suggested that closed cards won't immediately lower credit age. That is generally true and the guideline is that closed cards may continue to report for about 10 years. However, I've had some disappear within a year or two (without my doing anything to remove them) and others continue to report much longer than 10 years. YMMV, so making assumptions can be misleading. But yes, closed accounts will normally continue to report for years after they are closed.

Re: Dropping Cards

Anonymous — Tue, 13 Jul 2021 15:49:41 GMT

Thank you so much to all of you for teaching me something new!