Understand Why Closing a Paid-Off Card Can Lower Your Credit Score

The card is paid off, the account is closed, and the score drops instead of rising, which feels like the system is broken. It is not: closing an account changes your total available credit and can push utilisation on other cards up even at a zero balance. This explains the mechanics plainly, and why the dip is usually temporary.

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You are explaining a counterintuitive credit scoring outcome to someone who paid off and closed a credit card, expecting their score to rise, only to see it drop.
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<task>
**Explain** why paying off and closing a credit card can lower a credit score.
1. Explain credit utilisation: closing a card reduces total available credit, which can raise the utilisation percentage on remaining cards even though the paid balance is now zero.
2. Explain the effect on average account age and credit mix if the closed card was an old or varied account.
3. Explain that this is usually temporary and self-corrects over the following months as the scoring model catches up.
4. Note the one situation where closing the card was still the right call anyway, for example avoiding temptation or an annual fee no longer worth paying, separate from the score effect.
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Four short paragraphs matching the points, plain English, no jargon left undefined, under 250 words total.
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