Whoa. This is a good/scary feeling.

[SuperKirby]

Good job, James82!

[myjourney]

Congarts OP

Wonderful job indeed 

[djc1puno]

congrats, op! that's putting that check to good use expect a nice bump! whoo-hoo!

[noobody]

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@thirst305 wrote:

If you started the billing period with a balance, paying it off to 0 before the statement prints will likely yield a balance on CR and statement.  You will be assess interest for the average daily balance, therefore, none of your cards will report a 0 balance.  The one way I got around to this is paying the "anticipated" interest as well on my payment, that way even after they add in interest, the balance will still report 0 to the CR and statement.  Paying the 69 or not is inconsequential.

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+1

If you play safe, you should pay the whole 6069 PLUS whatever interest they charge you last month, to avoid any further interest.

[Networth]

Congrats OP, thats a great achivment and not many people are willing to strive for. Enjoy the feeling, just remember you didn't loose money, you paid money back you spent. That always made me feel better when I was giving big payments to lenders, and even currently when I PIF each money. Again great work! 

[James82]

I'll pay the $69. If I don't pay any additional that interest will be carried over to the next statement right? That carried over balance will then be charged interest on the next month? Thats the reason everyone is suggesting to pay more to keep that interest from being charged from the balance carrying over?

[James82]

And thank you everyone for the comments! Glad to know I'm heading in the right direction.

I'm going to go ahead and check the interest charged the last month on all the cards and pay a little more than that amount to keep the interest balance from carrying forward. Makes sense and will actually give me a $0 balance to start with.

[coterotie]

Okay, everyone is getting you reallyy confused so let's see if I can help.

First you need to check your terms and conditions to see if there is a "grace" period.  What this means is that charges you make in the current month and then pay off after the closing date of the statement but prior to or on your due date will incur no interest charges (cash advances are different so we'll exclude them).  Some cards have no grace period, CreditOne being an excellent example.  The day you charge something they start charging interest making it very difficult to PIF.  The only real way to do it is to PIF on your statement and make no charges the next month.  Then you will have a zero balance.  Of the cards I remember you having, alll of them had grace periods.

So...

The $69 will not matter in the interest charges scheme of things.  Here is why.  You carried a balance into the month from a previous month and paid it off during the month.  So for the portion of the month the money was outstanding you will see an interest charge on that amount plus a full months interest on the $69.  The new charges for the month (the interest) will incur NO interest charges.  If you charge say $100 and If you pay the balance in full you will not incur any additional charge for interest on those charges, but will incur interest on the $69.  So let's say the next month you start with a balance of $0.75 (the interest on the $69) and charge $200.  You allow this to report on the statement.  Your statement will show that you owe a minimum payment or a PIF amount of $200.75.  If you pay this amount, prior to or on your due date you will incur ZERO finance charges leaving you a ZERO balance.  This is how you get to paying no interest on your credit cards.  If you had paid the $69 with your intitial payment, the ZERO interest month would have happened one month sooner.  Which is why I said in the scheme of things it doesn't matter.

So you can have your cake and eat it too.  Charge what you can pay off each month.  Let it report.  Pay it prior to the due date.  You hit your utilization number, maximize your rewards and pay no interest.

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@James82 wrote:
And thank you everyone for the comments! Glad to know I'm heading in the right direction.

I'm going to go ahead and check the interest charged the last month on all the cards and pay a little more than that amount to keep the interest balance from carrying forward. Makes sense and will actually give me a $0 balance to start with.

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If you pay a little more, then you will have a negative balance on the cards which really freaks them out sometimes.  Actually had one card frozen while they mailed me a check.  All I was trying to do was give myself a cushion before we went on vacation.

[James82]

Ok that makes a LOT more sense to me.

The only question I have is my statement closes on the 6th of the month. But my due date is the 3rd. Does that mean that my due date is actually almost a full month away from statement closing?

If I'm also understanding you correctly, interest charges do not incur interest right? Like you said, interest will be charged to the account when the statement closes but they won't apply interest to an interest charge.

Also, the current statement is still open until the 6th. I could technically pay the $69 before the 6th to keep the $69 from being hit with interest?

[coterotie]

No your due date is 3 days before your statement date.

Unless the $69 is new charges, you will have to pay interest on it regardless.  You have a choice whether to pay two months or one months interest.  If you pay this month one month, next month 2 months.

Okay, interest is calculated on the average daily balance of old charges.  So to make it simple:

You have a balance of 2000 in charges that you have carried for a while.

Your interest rate is 1.5% per month.

You have a new charges of 1000

You pay 2030 on the 15th day of the statement cycle and your payments are applied to interest first, oldest charges next, then new charges.

Your next statement will have $1,000 in new charges which will incur zero interest charges if paid in full by the due date.

You will owe $15.00 in interest charges. (2000 * ((.015/30) * 15)))

You will need to pay a minimum of 1,015 by the next statement due date to avoid paying interest on anything.  If you pay 1,000 you will owe interest charges on $15.

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@James82 wrote:
Ok that makes a LOT more sense to me.

The only question I have is my statement closes on the 6th of the month. But my due date is the 3rd. Does that mean that my due date is actually almost a full month away from statement closing?

If I'm also understanding you correctly, interest charges do not incur interest right? Like you said, interest will be charged to the account when the statement closes but they won't apply interest to an interest charge.

Also, the current statement is still open until the 6th. I could technically pay the $69 before the 6th to keep the $69 from being hit with interest?

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