11 Strange but Effective Ways to Improve Your Credit Score

I've received questions from few readers asking me to post tips about improving credit scores which prompted me to do some research. To my surprise (and I'm sure to many of you) I found out that

30 percent of the people in the US are more embarrassed by their credit score than their weight!

Improving credit score is very similar to losing weight. It takes a lot of time and there are NO so-called “easy” fixes. In enhancing your score, you have to make the right moves and you must be consistent. Bear in mind credit score can affect your financial products such as loan interest rates and insurance rates.

Here are 11 tips that you can start today to improve your credit score:

1. Ask help from your family or friends.

If one of your family members or friends have better credit history, then you can use it. Adding yourself to a good account will enhance your credit score. Once you are added, you become an authorized user which allows you to pay your bills.

2. Do not close your old accounts.

Your old accounts affect your credit score. Closing one of them may hurt your credit score. Old accounts can tell another story regarding your maintaining credit, hence taking down the amount of available credit, which has positive effect on your score.

3. Pay your bills on time.

Many use auto-payments to conveniently pay their bills monthly. This is to prevent late payment and extra fees, which leads to improvement of your credit score.

4. Request for good-will deletions.

Ask credit reporting agencies and lenders regarding good-will deletions. Unpaid or late payments upset your credit score. Requesting for good-will deletions eliminate these issues from your account. This will work if you are a long-term customer.

5. Compensate credit card bills twice or more in a month.

Bear in mind that debt utilization ratio is an important factor in credit scores. This ratio shows your debt in accordance with your credit limit. Lowering debt utilization ratio can increase your credit score. Compensating your credit card bills twice or more every month can raise your score. The extra payments decrease your debt and at the same time, improves your available credit in one month.

6. Say “NO” to pre-approved offers.

Pre-approved offers from mails commonly need credit check and multiple credit checks which could negatively affect your credit score. It is also to prevent creating multiple accounts to avoid mistakes.

7. Evade new utility accounts.

Phone services, electricity, gas and other utilities involve credit checks which upsets your credit scores. It would be better if you allocate your utilities to a different address than creating new ones.

8. Return books.

Did you borrow books from public libraries? Did you return it? Libraries may send off your unpaid bills to collection agencies, which could lower your credit score.

9. Stay away from online quote comparisons.

Online quotes serve as queries of your credit score. When you request for a quote, your credit score is affected. Obtaining quotes from numerous websites also creates multiple credit checks. Choose wisely before attaining a quote, so your score won’t suffer.

10. Have long-term relationship with creditors.

Staying with your current creditor is the wisest decision you will ever make for your credit score. Although offers from other company are attractive, switching can influence your score undesirably.

11. Pay off your small bills.

These nuisance balances from multiple accounts can hurt your credit score. If you still have $700 on one and $400 on another, gather and pay off all of them. Reduce your accounts to one or two for your various transactions.

It is vital that you have a copy of your credit report to ensure you are on a right track in raising your credit score. Furthermore, it is important that you are enlightened with the factors that make your score go down or up.