Many things revolve around the three numbers that make up your credit score. It determines the car or house you live in, the type of investor you attract for your business and even the amount of your small business loan. When your credit is less-than-worthy, you need to try what you can to improve it. Not doing so will have long-lasting impacts on your business as well as personal life. If you are looking to give your score a quick boost, try out these three things and get yourself on the right path to creditworthiness.

1. Pay Your Bills When They Are Due

Do you have an old credit card that you let slide because you had other more pressing debts to pay?  Did that $150 a month have to go to something else, like a new monitor for your company? Not paying your bills on time can earn you the moniker of “slow pay,” and if you don’t pay it at all, you can wind up facing collections. Go through your budget and trim the fat to get everything paid on-time every time. Stop floating money and start using it to help improve your credit score.

2. Make Higher Payments Than the Minimum

Minimum payments come in handy when you can’t afford to sink another penny into that credit card. However, paying more than the minimum will wind up reducing the balance on that card until you finally pay it off. Paying off debt will do wonders to send your score soaring, so start a plan to do just that. Start with your smallest balance debt and put any extra monthly money you have towards paying the balance down. It may take you a few months – or even years – but doing this will eventually get the job done. Once you have it paid for, that all that money you were spending on that card and put it to the next-lowest debt on the list. This snowball method continues to build until you rid yourself of the obligations that plague your credit.

3. While Some Fixes Are Quick, the Process Will Take Time

If patience isn’t your strong suit, this is the time to work on it. Raising your credit score will take time – you didn’t go into debt overnight, and therefore, it won’t be fixed that quickly. Unless you experience a financial windfall, expect the credit cleanup to start reflecting in your score six months to a year after you start.

Fixing your credit score should be a priority, especially when also trying to run a business. Making a few tweaks to how you handle money and debt can make all the difference to your future credit abilities.