53% of consumers say their financial institution sent them a new payment card over the previous year because of a data breach or fraud, according to a 2016 report by Aite Group, a financial services research firm.
Choose one card to make automatic payments on recurring bills and another for everyday spending.
Designate one of your credit cards for trusted recurring autopay accounts, such as cellphone and utility bills, software subscriptions and news sites. Then don't use it for anything else. That way, the card isn't being processed by restaurant servers, gas station pump readers or online retailers- common ways thieves steal numbers.
Use one of your other credit cards for everyday spending, both in stores and online.
A flat-rate rewards card or an old card you want to keep active would be idea to use for autopay accounts. Using a rewards cards to accumulate cash-back rewards, points or miles makes sense for bills. You might have to pay them anyway, so you might as well get something for it. With cash-back cards, the rewards will be like a discount on your spending, assuming you pay your monthly credit-card bill in full and don't incur finance charges.
A flat-rate card is ideal because its rewards rate is the same regardless of the merchant. You can get a decent cash-back rate without having to juggle multiple cards or increasing your exposure to potential fraud.
Old, unused card. To keep credit scores high, you'll want to keep old credit-card accounts open, even if you don't like a card anymore, unless it charges an annual fee. The age of credit accounts is a major factor in the calculation of credit scores, as is your total credit line compared with the total amount of credit you're using.
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