How to Read Your Credit Card Statement
Key takeaways:
- Your credit card statement gives a summary of your purchases, your payment date, the amount due and any applicable fees and interest charges.
- Paying your statement balance in full helps you avoid interest charges. You should always make at least the minimum payment to avoid late fees.
- Review your credit card statement monthly to catch errors and look for identity theft.
Your monthly credit card statement might look like a mix of math and foreign language, but it contains important information about your purchases and payments. Reviewing the information for five to 10 minutes a month may save you from expensive errors or help you spot fraud.
This guide will help you understand what’s in your bill, how to pay it and what happens if you miss a payment.
What makes up my credit card statement?
Your credit card statement is a document that you receive each month that contains a list of your current month’s purchases, what you owe and other important details.
Here’s how to read a credit card statement to understand the information that’s most important to you:
Your previous balance is the unpaid amount from the previous credit card bill. Unless you’re using a 0% APR promotion, the unpaid amount from last month will be charged interest, which will be added to the amount that you owe.
The “purchases” line includes the full amount for all purchases that you made in-person, online and over the phone in the past month. Any returns and credits will offset your purchase amount.
Credit card issuers sometimes allow cardholders to transfer balances from other credit cards. If you transferred a balance to your card in the past month, you should see that amount under “balance transfers.” Balance transfers are generally charged fees and interest and may have a different APR than your purchases, though some banks offer 0% intro APRs for balance transfers.
Looking for the best balance transfer credit card?See our picks for the best credit cards for balance transfers.
You may see an amount under “cash advances” if you took a cash advance loan from your card over the past month. Various other transactions — e.g., purchasing lotto tickets or transferring money through Venmo — may also be counted as cash advances.
Cash advances don’t have a grace period, which means interest begins accumulating immediately. These interest rates tend to be the highest charged by the bank, and there’s also usually a fee to pay for the transaction. As such, you should avoid cash advances unless absolutely necessary.
Looking for the best cash advance credit card?See our picks for the best credit cards for a cash advance.
Under “interest,” you’ll find the interest you accumulated the past month for various transactions, based on your credit card’s annual percentage rate (APR). This may include interest on a balance that you carried over from the previous billing period, as well as interest on transactions that don’t qualify for your credit card’s grace period, such as cash advances.
At the bottom of your statement, you should find an “interest charges” section. This section breaks down your APRs and interest charges into a few categories — purchases, cash advances and balance transfers — to help you see how your interest was calculated.
Some credit cards (particularly those targeted to consumers with low credit scores) don’t offer a grace period for interest. If this is the case for your card, you’ll likely see an amount in the “interest charged” line if you made any purchases on the card in the past month.
On top of the payments you have to make that result from purchases and transactions, you may find various fees listed on your credit card statement. These may include:
- Annual fee: Some credit cards charge users an annual fee to help cover the benefits provided to cardholders. Certain credit cards waive the annual fee for the first year, while others charge no annual fee at all.
- Balance transfer fees: Banks typically charge 3% to 5% of the total amount transferred with a minimum fee of $5 to $10.
- Cash advance fees: These fees are charged when withdrawing money from an ATM or when conducting certain transactions, like buying lottery tickets or money orders). Common fees for a cash advance are 5% (minimum $10).
- Foreign transaction fees: When you make an international purchase while traveling abroad, many credit cards charge a foreign transaction fee. In addition, these fees may be charged when buying from a website outside the U.S. Typically, these range from 2.7% to 3%; however, some credit cards waive them entirely.
- Penalty fees: Banks may charge penalty fees when you miss your due date or go over your limit, or if your payment is returned by your bank. Your credit card’s guide details the type of fees you may incur and the amount charged for each one.
Looking for a low-cost credit card? See our picks for the best credit cards with no annual fee.This is the date by which you’ll need to make at least the minimum payment due, in order to avoid a late fee. In addition, you need to pay any nonpromotional balance off in full by this date to avoid paying interest on the unpaid balance.
You’ll also find a minimum payment warning on your statement — this shows the number of months and the amount of interest it will take to pay off your current balance making only minimum payments.
This is the part of your credit card statement where you want to spend the most time. It contains a list of all your purchases, payments and credits (refunds) that occurred during the billing cycle.Some credit cards keep purchases separate from payments and credits, while others list them chronologically by date.
Each bank formats its statements differently, so you may notice some, but not all, of these on your credit card statement.
- Transaction date: This is the date on which you made a purchase. In the case of payments or refunds, it’s the date on which those events occurred.
- Date the transaction posted: This is the date the purchase was added to your account, which may be a day or two after the transaction date.
- Merchant and location: You can see the store name and location of where your card was used. Some banks simply label this as “description.”
- Merchant category: This is the category that the merchant falls under, such as “travel” or “groceries.” This is useful information for rewards credit cards that give elevated rewards in certain categories, like groceries or gas.
- Reference number: These are a unique series of letters and numbers that can be traced back to the transaction.
- Last four digits of the card used: This is useful if you have an authorized user on the account or if you’ve applied for a card that provides an instant credit card number and use a mix of the virtual and physical card for your spending.
- Amount charged: This is the dollar amount of your transaction.
By reviewing your credit card account activity regularly, you can spot discrepancies and find ways to reduce your spending to fit your budget.
Since a credit card bill acts as a regular communication method between the bank and a cardholder, important notices are often included with the statement. These notices may include changes in terms, special promotions and offers from partners.
Savvy credit card users make it a habit to review their credit card statements regularly. You may consider setting up automatic payments to ensure the process happens seamlessly. But be careful not to fall into the set-it-and-forget-it trap — this could lead to an overdraft if your payment is more than the amount in your bank account, and you may be less likely to review your statements for errors.
How long should you keep credit card statements?
If you still receive paper statements, you typically don’t need them for more than 60 days, or roughly two billing cycles. Generally after this length of time, you’re not allowed to dispute billing errors. If you do have an open dispute, keep the paper statement until the dispute is resolved.
However, you can opt out of receiving paper statements and use your online account to access statements from previous months. You can find prior months’ and years’ statements under the “statement” tab. Unless you have a specific reason, you won’t need to download or print these, since they are easily accessible.
Note that if you use your credit card to buy tax-deductible purchases, plan to keep statements for three to six years — IRS audits usually go back three years, but no further than six. And if you have items that are covered by extended warranties from your credit card network, like Visa® or Mastercard®, keep them for the length of the warranty plus the additional time.
How to contact your issuer for billing questions
Most major credit card issuers allow you to pay your bill online, over the phone or by mail. Here are phone numbers, websites and payment addresses for the major credit card issuers in the United States.
| Issuer | Billing phone number | Billing website | Payment processing address |
|---|---|---|---|
| American Express | 800-472-9297 | Link | P.O. Box 96001, Los Angeles, CA 90096-8000 |
| Bank of America | 855-891-3401 | Link | P.O. Box 15019, Wilmington, DE 19850-5019 |
| Barclays | 877-523-0478 | Link | P.O. Box 60517, City of Industry, CA 91716-0517 P.O. Box 13337, Philadelphia, PA 19101-3337 |
| Capital One | 800-227-4825 | Link | Attn: Payment Processing, P.O. Box 71083, Charlotte, NC 28272-1083 |
| Chase | 800-436-7958 | Link | P.O. Box 6294, Carol Stream, IL 60197-6294 |
| Citibank | 800-950-5114 | Link | P.O. Box 9001037 Louisville, KY 40290-1037 |
| Discover | 800-347-2683 | Link | P.O. Box 70176, Philadelphia, PA 19176-0176 P.O. Box 71242, Charlotte, NC 28272-1242 P.O. Box 6103 Carol Stream, IL 60197-6103 P.O. Box 45909, San Francisco, CA 94145-0909 |
| U.S. Bank | 800-872-2657 | Link | P.O. Box 790408, St. Louis, MO 63179-0408 |
| Wells Fargo | 800-642-4720 | Link | P.O. Box 51193, Los Angeles, CA 90051-5493 |
If you pay your credit card bill online on the due date, note your issuer’s cutoff time and time zone. Some banks require payment before the end of business hours, while others give you until 11:59 p.m.
When paying by mail, also consider the time it’ll take for the payment to arrive. It’s generally advised to allow seven to 10 days for a payment to arrive at its destination.
The content above is not provided by any issuer. Any opinions expressed are those of LendingTree alone and have not been reviewed, approved, or otherwise endorsed by any issuer. The offers and/or promotions mentioned above may have changed, expired, or are no longer available. Check the issuer's website for more details.