How To Dispose a Credit Card In a Safe & Most Secure Ways

– Dispose of a Credit Card –

Dispose of a Credit Card: At some point, you will have to dispose of your old card safely and securely. This is an activity anyone can do at home. However, doing this wrongly could be very disastrous. In this article, we will show you the Safest Ways to discard an Old & unused Credit Card.

Dispose of a Credit Card

Why You Should Dispose of a Credit Card

Many people have hundreds and thousands of dollars of credit card debt. It may be nearly impossible to pay off these debts off without first eliminating spending. Once cardholders make the decision to dispose of their credit card, the elimination process can begin.

Dispose of a Credit Card if Cardholders Have Bad Credit

Credit card debt weighs heavily on credit scores. Bad credit can prevent cardholders from ever owning a home, car, or anything else that requires good credit. Getting rid of credit cards is the best way to rebuild credit and restore creditworthiness so that potential creditors will extend credit.

Dispose of a Credit Card if Cardholders Receive a New Card

Credit card companies send new cards when the old card is about to expire. Once the new card is received in the mail, the old card should be destroyed.

Dispose of Credit Cards to Prevent Identity Theft

Credit cards that are not properly disposed of can cause problems for the cardholder. It could take months before a cardholder realizes that someone has used the credit card, and by that time, the damage is already done.

What to do before you dispose of a Credit Card

If you’re canceling, don’t plot the destruction of your card right away. It’s good to take a few steps in order to ensure that there won’t be any outstanding issues with the account. Those moves are:

  1. Close the account— For this, you’ll need to contact your issuer. They’ll guide you through the process once you inform them you’re canceling.
  2. Notify other users— Any authorized cardholders sitting on your account need to know their cards will no longer be valid. It’s good to suggest that they destroy their cards too.
  3. Modify/cancel automatic payments— We all like convenience, and automatic payments through a card are common these days. If you have any set up with your soon-to-be former credit card, they’ll have to be ported to another means of payment.

READ ALSO:

Steps to Properly Dispose of a Credit Card

Dispose of a Credit Card

Credit card disposal is important if a cardholder wants to protect his or her identity. The following are tips to dispose of credit cards:

Shred and Cut Credit Cards

Some shredders have the capability to shred a credit card. The shredder cuts the credit card in equal strips but this is not enough. Take a pair of scissors and make sure to cut the security code, the account number, and any additional numbers on the credit card. Throw away a few pieces each trash collection day. It is impossible for someone to reconstruct the credit card if these steps are followed.

Burn the Credit Card

The fireplace or an outside fire pit is great for destroying a credit card. Make sure that the process is monitored. The fire should destroy any existence of the credit card.

Destroy Magnetic Strip

The magnetic strip contains all of the cardholder’s information. Take a strong magnet and drag it across the magnetic strip a few times. This demagnetizes the card and makes it unusable. The next thing to do is to place the credit card inside of a powerful blender to shred it to pieces. Dispose of the card in various trash bags.

Send Back Metal Cards

Destroying a metal card by yourself is harder and potentially dangerous. Contact your issuer. Typically, you can mail it back for disposal.

What to do after you destroy a Card

You’re not done yet! There is still a very important move to make: Pay the outstanding balance. Yes, your card is gone, but your balance probably isn’t. Make sure you take care of this, hopefully by paying on time to avoid any interest being charged.

Thoroughly destroy the card to ensure that it is unusable and limit the possibilities of any fraud. Demagnetize the magnetic strip, destroy the chip, cut up the card, and then dispose of the fragments in multiple bags.

If a cardholder does not properly dispose of a credit card and it gets in the wrong hands, there can be years of problems caused by this simple mistake.

We hope this article was useful and educative, do well to share these messages with friends and loved ones. If you have a question, kindly drop your comments below.

Similar Posts

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *