Amazon Credit Card Minimum Payment Amount for 2023 (2024)

If you don’t pay your credit card bill at all, you will likely get charged a late fee, lose your grace period, and have to pay interest at a penalty rate. Your credit score will also go down if you fall at least 30 days behind on a credit card bill payment. If you continue to not pay, your issuer may close your account. But you’ll still be responsible for the bill.... read full answer

If you don’t pay your credit card bill for a long enough time, your issuer could eventually sue you for repayment or sell your debt to a collections agency (which could then sue you). But it’s not all or nothing with credit card payments. It’s an entirely different story if you simply pay the minimum amount required.

Why you should pay at least the minimum payment:

If you always pay at least the minimum required by your due date, your account will remain in good standing and you won’t have to face late fees, penalty rates or credit score damage. You’ll just have to pay interest on the remaining balance at your card’s regular rate.

Here’s what happens if you don’t pay your credit card:

• If you pay the minimum required but not the full balance due: Your total unpaid balance will accrue interest at your card’s regular APR. You’ll also lose your grace period, so new purchases will accrue interest right away, too.
• If you don’t pay at all: Your account will be reported as past-due to the credit bureaus after two missed due dates. That will hurt your credit score. In addition, a late fee of up to $40 may be tacked onto your balance (but it can’t exceed your minimum payment). Your issuer may also apply a penalty APR to new purchases, though they must inform you 45 days in advance.
• If you get 60 days behind on minimum payments: The issuer can apply a penalty APR to your entire existing balance.
• If you get 180 days behind on minimum payments: The credit card company will have to charge off your debt (consider it a loss for taxes). But that doesn’t mean they’ll stop trying to get you to pay. They may sell your debt to a collections agency, or they may choose to sue you.
• If you don’t pay for 3-15 years: You are vulnerable to a lawsuit, depending on which state you live in. Time-barred debt is not a valid defense until your state’s statute of limitations runs out. If you lose a lawsuit and are ordered to pay, you might have your wages or bank account garnished.

So, the bottom line is that you should always try to make at least the minimum payment on your credit card. Sure, you’ll still owe interest, but you won’t have to deal with the other negative consequences of not paying your credit card at all.

If you’ve fallen behind, the most important thing to do is catch up on your missed minimum payments and bring your account back to current status. After that, your goal should be to pay your full balance due for two months straight. Though that’s easier said than done, doing so will restore your grace period and stop the buildup of new interest.

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No, making just the minimum payment on a credit card does not hurt your credit score, at least not directly. It actually does the opposite. Every time you make at least the minimum credit card payment by the due date, positive information is reported to credit bureaus. Plus, the exact amount you pay doesn’t factor into the payment history portion of your credit score. It’s simply noted that you’ve made a payment on time.... read full answer

What you should know before making just the minimum payment:

• There is a way your credit score could eventually be impacted by only making minimum payments, because it results in a high credit utilization.
• Credit utilization is the percentage of your total available credit that’s being used, or your debt-to-credit ratio.
• If you make a habit of racking up more credit card charges than you can pay for every month, you’ll end up with high utilization.
• Credit-scoring companies see credit utilization over 30% as a negative. To what degree high utilization will affect a credit score depends on your personal credit history and which scoring model is used. But it’s safe to say your debt-to-credit ratio accounts for 20% or more of your credit score.
• If you don’t have much credit history, high utilization will have a greater impact on your score than it would for someone with a diverse and lengthy credit history.

Paying only the minimum amount due on your credit card may seem cheaper in the short term, but you’ll pay for the convenience in interest. Plus, it could reach a point where even the minimum payment is unaffordable. On that note, be advised that credit card payments below the minimum amount due don’t count as on-time payments. And not making the minimum payments can spell real trouble for your credit score.

So, regularly paying only the minimum on a credit card could hurt your credit score in the long run. That’s because it could lead to you spending beyond your needs and racking up more debt than you can afford to repay.

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You shouldn't carry a balance on your credit card unless you have to. If your goal is to use your card but still maintain low credit utilization for credit-scoring purposes, you should aim to have an outstanding balance as close to $0 as possible at the end of your monthly billing cycle. For more information on this, please see our ... read full answerCredit Utilization Guide.

If you believe making purchases with plastic will cause you to overspend, you’re better off not using your card at all. When in doubt, debt-free is the way to be.

Credit utilization is basically the ratio of your outstanding credit card balance divided by your credit limit. Utilization that is too high indicates you are desperate for spending power and may encounter payment problems down the road. That is certainly a valid concern, considering how debt can easily snowball into unsustainability and thus impede credit-building efforts. It’s therefore unsurprising that people with credit utilization above 90% have the lowest credit scores on average, while those with utilization between 1% and 10% have the highest scores.

And remember, the best way to monitor your credit utilization is to sign up for a free WalletHub account, which updates your credit-report information and credit score on a daily basis.

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