When to pay credit cards for best score

If you know when to pay credit cards for best score, and keep to it each and every month, you will add a positive spin to your credit file. The timing is important - but very simple. Pay your credit card bill on time.  It's as simple as that.

If you refer to the information about how a credit score is calculated, you will see that 35% of the total credit score - that's over one third - comes from your credit payment history. If you are late in paying, that scores against you. The number of times you have paid late scores against you, as does the number of months any unpaid bill remains overdue. And if late payment stretches over a number of accounts that's another blip on your credit file.

On the upside, any accounts that have been paid as per the loan agreements, score for you.

The sensible way to pay credit cards is to arrange for the monthly payments to be paid automatically by your bank. That way you know that the minimum monthly payment will have been paid through to your credit card companies by the due date, without you having to do anything about it each month. Of course, you do need to ensure that your bank account has sufficient funds in it to make the automatic payment on the due date.

Then, if you can afford to pay more off your card balances, go to the bank and make an additional payment before you receive your next monthly statement.  Reducing your card balances this way helps broaden the gap between your total credit limits and the actual amount of debt you are carrying at any time, and lenders like to see that.