when you're done paying a credit card bill, do you call to cancel the card, or do you destroy the card?

If you destroy the card and close the account the credit history goes with it. Two things affect your score by doing it. It reduces your overall credit availability and it reduces the amount of months you have had credit. By closing it you lose both factors which affect your score. You can leave the account open and don't use the card or use it once or twice to keep from having the bank closing it. People that keep switching credit cards because of lower interest find that their scores are lower than a similar person who has maintained one or two accounts. An account that has been open for two years is better than having opened and closed three accounts in that same time period. When it comes time for you to get a car or home loan, the lengthy history will work more in your favor than not. Now if you're the person who has a tendency to run up credit cards because the money is available then destroy it. Better your credit score go down than being always in debt.

for sure work more! Talk to your parents. Talk to the credit card company. If you happen to "miss" a payment they will usually take off the fees if you call them up....(my friends have done that). Although, I am not advising you to skip/miss a payment but I do believe if you just work more or get a job you can make that minimum payment. 150 dollars is not that much. As long as you are able to work alot and you do not have any prior bills to pay, you should be able to afford it. Cut that sucker up and stop using it! Credit cards are horrible! If you don't have the money in cash to pay for the things you want then don't them! They are not THAT important! Good luck to you! Make those payments! Don't ruin your credit!!! It's extremely hard to get in good standing once you ruin it!

It isn't necessarily the best for your credit, because as you leave your card open it will show an available balance that you could have money out on but don't. So it will show better self control. The other factor that will help your credit history on a card that you don't use is that it will show a longer time with credit, which is always a good thing. So you would be better destroying the card and not closing the account.

I like ro's answer - you hit key points.

Yes it is true that if you cancel a credit card it can be bad for your credit history and affect your credit score in a negative way. Individual factors for your situation will determine if it is a negative or not. Factors include: overall number of open credit accounts (especially revolving debt), % of available credit being used on open credit, length of time history available for open credit.

Years ago the idea was to close all unused credit to not have the open unused credit on the account. In today's world, if you do not have but two or three open credit cards, it is best to keep them open, once in a while use it and pay it off as long as there are no annual fees. This provides the number of open trade lines lenders look for and the positive history over 24 months. The longer the positive history the better.

Review your entire credit report and see what you have for positive credit review and where this credit card fits as a positive credit factor for time opened, on-time payments, percent of balance used at any given time. Are there other credit card accounts that provide this for you and this one is really so new that it won't have an impact? Then close it.

It is best to cancel the card if you want to close the account. Otherwise it will stay open and fees will continue to be added to the account.

Its not bad for your credit history, because it would show that you closed the account yourself.

It is better to keep the card account open. It does help your credit score.

I've also heard it was bad for your credit history. I would cut up the card so you weren't tempted to use it. But you'll still have to pay any annual fees and finace charges they apply to the card. So if you want to be completely done paying money to this credit card company you'll have to cancel it.

both. You should call and cancel the card and then destroy it. The less you have open on your credit report the better. Also, if you have that card open on your credit and you destroy it, someone can very easily steel your identity and use that card to rack up credit in your name, and you wouldn't know it until it was too late!

Cancel and Destroy!

Don't close out the card! That apparently hurts your credit score. Just cut it up and throw it away.

Both, unless you wish to continue using it. Closing an account does affect your score a little, but there's really no reason to keep the account open if you don't plan on using the card.