I need help with my FICO scores?

fico scores, I need to know if closing your credit card with balances effects your fico scores and if paying off one and increasing the minium payments on the others, helps your score. I only kept 2 credit accounts open. How long does it take to increase your score. My score is at 642 and I would like to be at least 680 with the next 6 months.

Public Comments

1. Closing credit cards never has and never will do any good for credit scores. Never close your oldest credit card. Length of credit history is 15% of your fico. Closing accounts will only hurt your score since you will be reducing your overall available unused limits on all your cards. There is only one way to get top 800+ scores. Use your card for things you need and pay in full each month. /
2. Credit scores normally go up by 3-5 points per month. Closing a credit card WILL affect your score negatively. Make sure that the balances on ALL of your cards are below 30% of their limit. Pay AL LEAST twice the minimum payment. Doing those simple things should get you to 680 in 6 months or so. Its going to be close!!!