AMEX QUESTION

[Anonymous]

Looking at my amex account it says that my  remaining statement balance was $50. I just made a 200 dollar purchase and made a payment of 100$. My statement closes in a few days so my question is, when I made the payment it cleared the amount that I had left over from last statment balance but I still owe $150. So how will amex report this if I leave it as is?  Will it report as 0 dollars? Or will it report the 150 balance? 

 Its my only account that shows like this so just trying to get some clarification.

Thanks in advance

[Anonymous]

Of course $150, what is your logic behind $0 scenario?

[K-in-Boston]

If I read your post correctly, you made a $100 payment with a $50 statement balance, bringing you to -$50, and you have made $200 in purchases in the current statement period bringing you to a current account balance of $150. If that is the case, Amex will report the correct $150 balance to the credit bureaus when your statement closes.

[Anonymous]

Because its showing how much I have left to payoff the previous statement balance and none of my other cards do this so I was trying to figure out what the point was.  And also, when I googled amex reporting, I found a thread that said they report weird.

   So I was just trying to get an understanding, as I want to carry a balance on the card and thought by me making the 100 dollar payment and it now saying 0 when I log in,  it would show on my report that Im not using any of my cards.

so basically, I was just thrown off by how with amex once you log in it highlights the last month info and I just was not use to that. 

[Anonymous]

1. It's there to remind you that you still have remaining balance on your previous statement, others might not highlight it at login but it's definitely displayed somewhere on dashboard. The point is if you don't pay off the balance by due date, you'll end up carrying a balance.

2. Reporting a balance and carrying a balance are two different things. Reporting balance is what you just did.  Carrying a balance means you didn't pay off the $50 previous statement balance by due date and allowing it to "carry" over to the next statement, it also means you will have to pay interest on the $50 as well as future charges from the date of the charge due to losing your grace period because you started to carry a balance.

[Anonymous]

Thank you for clarifying that for me.  Still learning so every bit of information helps.

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Thank you for clarifying that for me.  Still learning so every bit of information helps.

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No problem, helping is the ninja way.

[Anonymous]

Just want to make sure, was that $100 payment made before the due date?

[Anonymous]

Yes, the payment was made on time. So it should go like this?

ex: due date 20th report on 25th. On the due date I need to pay everything off, then before the reporting day 25th make a purchase so that it report usage? Then after the 25th payoff the amount I used to show a balance reporting?

thank you for your responses.

[K-in-Boston]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Yes, the payment was made on time. So it should go like this?

ex: due date 20th report on 25th. On the due date I need to pay everything off, then before the reporting day 25th make a purchase so that it report usage? Then after the 25th payoff the amount I used to show a balance reporting?

thank you for your responses.

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You don't need to pay everything  off by the 25th, unless you're trying to show a lower amount of utilization on your credit reports than you actually use on the card.  For this exercise, let's assume the dates really do stay 20 and 25:

January 26-February 25, you charge $4000 in purchases.  Your statement that closed on February 25th shows $40 minimum due and a $4000 statement balance.  To avoid accruing interest, you would need to pay the $4000 statement balance on or before March 20th.

Now, let's say that between February 26th and March 19th, you charged an additional $3000 but have not yet made a payment.  Your account will show a remaining statement balance of $4000 and a total balance of $7000. 

- If you pay $7000 and do not make any more charges, on March 25th when you statement closes, Amex will report your balance as $0, which is correct and both your remaining statement balance and total balance will be $0. 

- If you pay $4000 and do not make any more charges, Amex will show your remaining statement balance as $0, your total balance as $3000, and on the 25th when your statement closes, they will report your balance correctly as $3000 and the next day you'll see that your new remaining statement balance is $3000.

- If you pay $6000 and do not make any more charges, Amex will show your remaining statement balance as $0, your total balance as $1000, and on the 25th when your statement closes, they will report your balance correctly as $1000 and the next day you'll see that your new remaining statement balance is $1000.

- If you pay $1000 and do not make any more charges, Amex will show your remaining statement balance as $3000, your total balance as $6000, and on the 25th when your statement closes, they will report your balance correctly as $6000 and you will begin accruing interest as you did not pay your previous statement in full.  You would continue to pay interest (from day 1 on all new charges, as well), until you have paid your full statement balance two months in a row.