topic Re: Closed First Progress in Credit Cards

Closed First Progress

sghosh5 — Wed, 08 Jan 2014 20:02:46 GMT

Just before it hit one year mark and charge me the annual fee, closed First Progress card today. One year back, i opened this account to start my credit rebuild journey with a terrible score of 499 !! Certainly it helped me to rebuild. I barely used it and paid in full.

Now as I got almost all premier cards, don't need this card anymore. Hoping that it will still continue adding effect AAOA

Re: Closed First Progress

bigblue7722 — Wed, 08 Jan 2014 20:07:49 GMT

Congrats on closing the card

Re: Closed First Progress

sghosh5 — Wed, 08 Jan 2014 20:12:14 GMT

Thanks! Hope they give my money back. Phone rep said it will take 30-60 days to send the money back...ridiculous

Re: Closed First Progress

bigblue7722 — Wed, 08 Jan 2014 20:17:11 GMT

@sghosh5 wrote:
Thanks! Hope they give my money back. Phone rep said it will take 30-60 days to send the money back...ridiculous

that is crazy hopefull they will send it back sooner

Re: Closed First Progress

Anonymous — Wed, 08 Jan 2014 21:31:51 GMT

Congrats OP on the account closure! I keep going back & forth on keeping First Progress open too. I've had it for about 6 months.....and other than that "obligatory" charge on it every so often, in the SD it sits! I definitely will not keep it past its anniversary date. However, now I keep questioning whether or not the "hassle" of maintaining it is even worth another 6 more months of positive tradeline history....? Oh well, I guess we'l see.....

Again congrats to you.....onward to bigger & better for sure!

Re: Closed First Progress

sghosh5 — Wed, 08 Jan 2014 21:42:38 GMT

I know the pain of keeping it open. Though i pay the balance in full, it will still show its due on the account management, making it very confusing. Then there was that 10 day period of making one after another payment. I kept this card on my netflix account to charge that 8.85 every month and they i paid that at the end of the month. Another inconvenience about account management for this card was being unable to set up 'auto pay'. Rather than these, the card was best in reporting fast on all 3 credit reports every month and definitely helped me to get where i am now.

Re: Closed First Progress

Anonymous — Wed, 08 Jan 2014 21:59:07 GMT

@sghosh5 wrote:
I know the pain of keeping it open. Though i pay the balance in full, it will still show its due on the account management, making it very confusing. Then there was that 10 day period of making one after another payment. I kept this card on my netflix account to charge that 8.85 every month and they i paid that at the end of the month. Another inconvenience about account management for this card was being unable to set up 'auto pay'. Rather than these, the card was best in reporting fast on all 3 credit reports every month and definitely helped me to get where i am now.

+1 Totally agree. Although its website - and really any technology-related aspect of this card - leaves a LOT to be desired, it's definitely served its main purpose! I'm also grateful it's worked well with my BillPay too with prompt payment postings.

But you're right, maintaining it isn't as "fun" as it used to be early on, lol. I guess that just comes with the territory......a means to a much brighter end.

P.S. I'd be interested to hear your opinion -- do you think it's too early for me to close this account?

Re: Closed First Progress

sghosh5 — Wed, 08 Jan 2014 22:03:06 GMT

Looking at your signature and the cards you have now, i can say you are good to close it now if you are not using the card at all. AAOA will still be there even after closing an account till 10 years. So to me, there is no point for you to keep it open. In fact i heard having a lower limit card on profile may sometime affect other creditors' decisions to give you bigger limits. May not be true though.

Re: Closed First Progress

Anonymous — Wed, 08 Jan 2014 22:22:35 GMT

@sghosh5 wrote:
Looking at your signature and the cards you have now, i can say you are good to close it now if you are not using the card at all. AAOA will still be there even after closing an account till 10 years. So to me, there is no point for you to keep it open. In fact i heard having a lower limit card on profile may sometime affect other creditors' decisions to give you bigger limits. May not be true though.

So funny that you say that. I had read that same thing (which is another reason I was thinking of closing it). Ironically though just two days ago while speaking wtih a Barclays credit analyst (to re-con my app for the Arrival card), my history on the First Progress was actually one of the "positives" she pointed out to me, lol! Probably because many the major CC's listed in my sig are fairly new - some not reporting yet (like the AmEx's). Either way, I found it interesting for that analyst to "notice" FP....but hey, I'll take it.

Anyway, thank you for your opinion. I think you've convinced me to close it sooner than later....at least by the time the first AmEx hits my report......thank you & congrats on all of your progress so far too!