@Anonymous wrote:
@Stryder wrote:I guess I'm confused on the purpose of leaving a balance to go to statement and then pif because they charge you interest for that. I understand letting a balance carry every once in awhile to make sure the bureaus see activity, but what ever is left after your due date payment, you get charged interest and have a payment due that reports.. Maybe I'm missing the point about this thread, but I'll let around 30% of my cards report and rotate them around, but for the most part...my cards report zero.
If it's what I understood from the OP, AMex says to carry the balance and then pif...I'm sure they do so they can charge interest.
You're confusing "reporting a balance" and "carrying a balance".
Reporting a balance - Allow charges to be posted to statement and report them to the CRA, you do not pay interest on this balance as long as you pay the full statement balance before due date. However, there is an exception to this, if you have been carrying a balance in prior cycles and have not gone through the steps to restore grace period, you will be paying interest even if you PIF by due date.
Carrying a balance - When you fail to pay the full statement balance by due date and carries that balance to the next cycle, interest start on the new statement immediately, as well as new charges on the purchase date util a statement successfully reports a $0 balance and grace period restored.
+1 ^^^ This exactly.
Carrying the same balance over multiple months (without paying in full) is what you want to avoid, unless there's a distinct need/reason to do so, or there's a 0% promo.
Letting the statement cut with a balance due is fine, simply pay in full by the due date and you won't pay any interest.
I personally never pay a bill before the statement cuts; once the statement is generated and I have a due date, then I pay in full; easy-peasy. 
@The-Credit-Disciple wrote:
Great morning My Fico Familia😀
My Question is do you have to leave a balance on your Amex Card? Because when I got the card 6 months ago, i got an email from Amex stating " that in order to get a CLI i need to keep a balance every month so that i can make payments. Is that a must or should I PIF every month? Last month I left $1 balance, please Help my Fico Fam😀 thanks in advance
You can pay it off before the statement cuts, and that will not affect your getting a credit limit increase.
In my particular case, I was in the Amex version "credit steps," which seems to be your case. I let a small balance REPORT (never carried) on the statment, then PIF immediately. I received the auto increase from $500 to $1000, then put in for the CLI of 3x and also received that putting the card at $3000. I have never paid a dime of interest to Amex with this method and it seems to have maximized growth. ;-)
This brings up a thought for me: By allowing the statement to 'cut', and then PIF immediately, that keeps the interest away however doesn't that statement being cut mean that's the balance being reported to the bureau's... thus increasing your utilization? I thought you wanted to have the balance paid prior to a statement being reported, but could be wrong.
@Anonymous wrote:
@Cred4All wrote:This brings up a thought for me: By allowing the statement to 'cut', and then PIF immediately, that keeps the interest away however doesn't that statement being cut mean that's the balance being reported to the bureau's... thus increasing your utilization? I thought you wanted to have the balance paid prior to a statement being reported, but could be wrong.
Yes, you want to make payments prior to statement cut to control your UTI when you have a need to maximize your score, like prior to loan applications but it's not necessary all the time, why put on your expensive suit and tie every morning when you work from home and won't be seeing anyone?
Micromanaging your UTI, or implementing AZEO, has a cost associated with it, why pay that cost for no reason. The smartest practice when you have no immediate plans to apply is to let your charges post to statement (don't even need to PIF immediately), set your CC autopay to pay the full statement balance on due date (should be done as a safety net even when micromanaging UTI), keep your payment you otherwise would have made before statement in interest paying accounts through grace period, only make extra payment before statement date after extra large purchases (or if you have a toy limit card) to keep individual UTI under 29%, then sit back, relax, and let your credit and money work for you.
Yes you might lose a few points on FICO but who cares if you're not applying for anything? You can get those points back by micromanaging UTI or implementing AZEO the cycle before applications.
@Anonymous information @Anonymous, love the expensive suit analogy! Thank you.