@Anonymous wrote:
Why is not a good idea to let the Chase card be the reporting card?
Because when you pay it down to $0 post statement (so as to not be charged interest) Chase will report $0 to the bureaus... and all revolving tradelines at $0 is a straight penalty. As a result it's typically best to use some other card as the one to report a balance on, though any "emergency" spending that will wind up awkwardly on my reporting card when I have to maintain a pristine file and score (or as good as it gets in my world pre-application) winds up on a Chase card just for this very reason.
@Anonymous wrote:english ain't my first language, so I kind of lost you here "though any "emergency" spending that will wind up awkwardly on my reporting card when I have to maintain a pristine file and score (or as good as it gets in my world pre-application) winds up on a Chase card just for this very reason". By the way, Im not saying Im going to let all card report zero balance, so I still don't get why letting 3 card report zero balance and 1 Chase card report a balance would not be a good idea. Isn't the idea to leave 1 card report balance regardless which card it is?
anyway, I just got an email from Chase and they report to the credit agencies at the statement date, so paying the balance before the due date won't report a zero balance. I just have to make sure that the 15th (statement date) of every other month I have a balance to get reported, then pay it.
Because Chase has a very specific policy, and to our knowledge it's unique; namely, if you pay a Chase card to $0, Chase will do a mid-cycle update and re-report the tradeline as $0.
As a result, if you have 1 Chase card with balance, and the rest at zero, if you pay the Chase card in full, it will report zero, and then all of your cards report zero which is a straight FICO negative. I promise you this the way it works from personal experience with multiple Chase cards and the reports from MANY people on this forum.
As a result use some other card for your reported balance. What the CSR told you is not fully correct.
With regards to what I said, there's a lag time both in payment, and in transaction processing... so if I have some charges coming up close to a statement date, and I don't know if they'll clear in time for my being able to pay them, I put them on a Chase card because regardless of what Chase reports for a statement balance, I can zero it out by simply paying the Chase account in full. That's what I meant by emergency spending, something that wasn't planned that was going to mess up my pretty balances.
Also that delay time between payment being made and payment processed, is why the majority of people simply PIF on or before the due date (as usually statement generates a couple days afterwards and you need that extra time for the payment to process with multiple lenders) but that includes all the charges for the current month too... and therefore get a $0 statement balance. It's just sematics, you are correct that it's the statement balance which matters for everyone other than Chase, but you have to pay it ahead of time to get that.
@redbeard wrote:
@jamie123 wrote:I think you are misunderstanding me...
The way to pay the REPORTING card is like this:
1. At least 3 days BEFORE the due date, make a payment to get the reporting balance where you want it at less than 10%.
2. Let the card report the small balance.
3. Pay the card in full AFTER the due date and take it to $0.
You want to pay all the other cards to $0 at least 2 to 3 days BEFORE the due date so they report a balance of $0.
I understand a lot of people say it exactly like this with the 2 payments, but for credit scoring, there is no need to make 2 payments. The balance on the statement date is usually the balance that reports.
If you pay after the due date and before the statement date, you may have a $0.00 balance reported, which will defeat the purpose of not paying it off by the due date.
Let me put this in real life example.
My capital one card has a $750 limit, due on the 5th of the month.
I have Netflix billed to this card. I pay Netflix 14.95 a month (say $15) on the 7th of the month.
My statement close date is the 9th of the month.
If I have $0.00 on the due date because I paid it off on the 3rd, before the due date, the Netflix charge will show up on my statement and credit report balance as the amount due.
If no other transactions, as long as I pay the $14.95 by the next due date, I don't have an interest charge.
Then Netflix strikes again.
I'll always have $14.95 reporting, unless I log in and pay it after it posts, but before the statement cuts, but it doesn't bother me that much.
Dan
That only applies to charges in a given month; after the following due date the grace period is smoked and you're being charged interest. That's why it's suggested 2 payments on the account which you are reporting a balance on, and that second payment needs to come on or before the due date of the following month and need to zero it out to prevent interest accumulation.
Admittedly that sort of assumes you aren't rotating your balances; I don't do that very much, pretty much my Sallie always reports a balance and I twiddle everything else when I have to get cleaned up but I don't micromanage when I'm not prepping for an application.
Any account that you want at zero, yes a single payment is sufficient.
Think that's the point Jamie and others were trying to get at.
Revelate wrote:
Because Chase has a very specific policy, and to our knowledge it's unique; namely, if you pay a Chase card to $0, Chase will do a mid-cycle update and re-report the tradeline as $0.
As a result, if you have 1 Chase card with balance, and the rest at zero, if you pay the Chase card in full, it will report zero, and then all of your cards report zero which is a straight FICO negative. I promise you this the way it works from personal experience with multiple Chase cards and the reports from MANY people on this forum.
As a result use some other card for your reported balance. What the CSR told you is not fully correct.
With regards to what I said, there's a lag time both in payment, and in transaction processing... so if I have some charges coming up close to a statement date, and I don't know if they'll clear in time for my being able to pay them, I put them on a Chase card because regardless of what Chase reports for a statement balance, I can zero it out by simply paying the Chase account in full. That's what I meant by emergency spending, something that wasn't planned that was going to mess up my pretty balances.
Also that delay time between payment being made and payment processed, is why the majority of people simply PIF on or before the due date (as usually statement generates a couple days afterwards and you need that extra time for the payment to process with multiple lenders) but that includes all the charges for the current month too... and therefore get a $0 statement balance. It's just sematics, you are correct that it's the statement balance which matters for everyone other than Chase, but you have to pay it ahead of time to get that.
When you say it reports mid-cycle, is it literal? Let's use my billing cycle so I don't get lost 
My cycle ends Sept. 15 so I have ~25 days after that to pay the bill (lets say $500), until the due date, Oct. 12, without acquiring interest. You are saying that Chase does another report mid-cycle, so on Sept. 28-29 Chase re-reports the balance. 1) If I lower the balance from $500 to $400 does Chase reports that new balance mid-cycle or only if I pay the whole balance? 2) If it re-reports mid-cycle (Sept. 28-29), can I just simply pay the $500 between Sept 30th and Oct. 12?. Then it will not report a zero balance on all card. 3) I will just have to make sure anything I take on the card between Sept. 16 to Oct. 15 (idealy before Oct. 15 to account for procces time) I'll pay down to the desire util ratio.
Basically, if I use the card and charge another $600 (between Sept.16-Oct.12), I will pay by Oct 12, $500 + what ever amount I want of the $600 that will bring my util to <10%.
I know Im just complicating things up, I just want to make sure I understand how things work. I'll probaly just let the card tthat doesnt have a mid-cycle report as my balance card.
To use a personal example, my recent CSP.
Statement report: 7K and change. Paid in full four days later, Chase reported a second time (mid-cycle, i.e. between statements) landed a few days afterwards, $0.
This also holds true on my Freedom, and I would assume on their cobrands as well.
@Anonymous wrote:@Revelate wrote:
Because Chase has a very specific policy, and to our knowledge it's unique; namely, if you pay a Chase card to $0, Chase will do a mid-cycle update and re-report the tradeline as $0.
As a result, if you have 1 Chase card with balance, and the rest at zero, if you pay the Chase card in full, it will report zero, and then all of your cards report zero which is a straight FICO negative. I promise you this the way it works from personal experience with multiple Chase cards and the reports from MANY people on this forum.
As a result use some other card for your reported balance. What the CSR told you is not fully correct.
With regards to what I said, there's a lag time both in payment, and in transaction processing... so if I have some charges coming up close to a statement date, and I don't know if they'll clear in time for my being able to pay them, I put them on a Chase card because regardless of what Chase reports for a statement balance, I can zero it out by simply paying the Chase account in full. That's what I meant by emergency spending, something that wasn't planned that was going to mess up my pretty balances.
Also that delay time between payment being made and payment processed, is why the majority of people simply PIF on or before the due date (as usually statement generates a couple days afterwards and you need that extra time for the payment to process with multiple lenders) but that includes all the charges for the current month too... and therefore get a $0 statement balance. It's just sematics, you are correct that it's the statement balance which matters for everyone other than Chase, but you have to pay it ahead of time to get that.
When you say it reports mid-cycle, is it literal? Let's use my billing cycle so I don't get lost
Basically, if I use the card and charge another $600 (between Sept.16-Oct.12), I will pay by Oct 12, $500 + what ever amount I want of the $600 that will bring my util to <10%.
I know Im just complicating things up, I just want to make sure I understand how things work. I'll probaly just let the card tthat doesnt have a mid-cycle report as my balance card.
Revelate probaly used the wrong term by saying mid-cycle.
Chase, and it is only Chase we are talking about here, will report a $0 balance to the CRAs as SOON AS YOUR PAYMENT CLEARS. It doesn't matter what time or day of the month that your account reaches a $0 balance. As soon as it gets to $0, Chase reports it to the CRAs as $0.
This is good and bad.
GOOD: You can have your Chase card report a $0 balance in three or four days after you PIF no matter what day of the month it is or where you are in your monthly billing cycle. They wait until your payment clears and then report the $0 balance to the CRAs.
BAD: If you want to use this card as a reporting card you can never take the card to a $0 balance. What you need to do is always use the card and pay the statement balance in full before the due date while making sure that you have additional charges on the card that month so the balance doesn't reach $0.
The entire CC forum bastardizes the term then
Mid-cycle report = any non-standard secondary report as a cycle would be defined as statement to statement (or month to month in the case of DCU and similar). May be a better word for it but I don't know of it.