Just about everyone will at some point in their lifetime have to deal with making late payments. Knowing about late payments and how they are handled by creditors, collection companies, and credit bureaus will save you time, money, and potentially your credit score. In this blog we’ll give you some tips on how to avoid late payments, how to mitigate the damage caused by late payments, and how to remove late payments from your credit score.
How to Avoid Late Payments
If possible, you should try and avoid making any late payments. Here are a couple tips to avoid the accidental late payment:
Set up direct payments on your credit card to pay your bills about a week before they are due. This way if there’s any issue with payment you can resolve it before the due date.
Keep your contact information with your creditors up to date. If that credit card you are using for your auto payments expires you will want to get the email or phone call saying your payment method failed in time to set up your new card or a different form of payment.
Keep a calendar or spreadsheet to track all your bills and due dates. Check them off as you see them deposited from your bank account.
These simple tips will help you avoid the accidental late payments. Unfortunately, sometimes you might just not have the money to make the payment on time. What should you do in that situation? You should mitigate the damage done by late payments.
How to Mitigate Late Payments
If you just cannot make a payment timely, contact your creditor and discuss the issue with them. They will almost certainly work with you to set up a new payment date or a payment plan. Ignoring the problem will not make it better but being honest and straightforward with your creditor just might keep it from getting reported on your credit report.
Okay, let’s say you are finding this article just a little too late and late payments have already been reported to the credit bureaus. You need to know how to remove late payments from your credit report.
How to Remove Late Payments from Your Credit Score
Even if late payments get reported to your credit score, there are still ways to minimize the damage and even potentially get the late payments removed. If you need late payment advice there are plenty of resources online for you to peruse through.
Have you ever had to deal with late payments? What strategies worked best for you? We would love to hear all about your late payment success stories and lessons learned in the comments section below.