topic Re: When Did Credit Card Banks Start Offering Autopay? in General Credit Topics

When Did Credit Card Banks Start Offering Autopay?

10022016 — Wed, 20 Oct 2021 04:24:47 GMT

Was it some kind of law or banks just decided to play nice?

Re: When Did Credit Card Banks Start Offering Autopay?

CreditInspired — Wed, 20 Oct 2021 09:41:52 GMT

@10022016 wrote:
Was it some kind of law or banks just decided to play nice?

I'm not positive, but I think the answer is neither. Banks just want their money and also want to make money. Autopay kind of guarantees they're getting payments consistently and on time; and autopay is cheaper--no having to handle checks. And no having to wait for the proverbial, "the check is in the mail."

Re: When Did Credit Card Banks Start Offering Autopay?

pizzadude — Wed, 20 Oct 2021 14:17:58 GMT

I agree, it's really a win-win situation - lending institutions receive more timely payments, consumers have fewer late fees / missed payments.

Re: When Did Credit Card Banks Start Offering Autopay?

FinStar — Wed, 20 Oct 2021 14:44:35 GMT

@10022016 wrote:
Was it some kind of law or banks just decided to play nice?

There was no law nor regulatory requirement. Financial institutions simply implemented an additional option for payments no different than allowing expedited payments over the phone (with a fee in some cases).

Re: When Did Credit Card Banks Start Offering Autopay?

SoCalGardener — Wed, 20 Oct 2021 17:59:30 GMT

@10022016 wrote:
When Did Credit Card Banks Start Offering Autopay?

I can't say for sure when it was, but I know it's been available for a long time now. I could (but will spare everyone) tell you a whole story about putting DirecTV on auto-pay back when that first became an option... That was in the '90s, by the way.

Re: When Did Credit Card Banks Start Offering Autopay?

10022016 — Thu, 21 Oct 2021 03:00:15 GMT

Well, I don't see how it's a win-win situation since if you miss a payment, they can skyrocket your interest rate.

Re: When Did Credit Card Banks Start Offering Autopay?

Have1 — Thu, 21 Oct 2021 07:33:08 GMT

@10022016 wrote:
Well, I don't see how it's a win-win situation since if you miss a payment, they can skyrocket your interest rate.

Auto pull payments are much more in the interests of your creditors than they are you. Set up auto push payments through your bank's bill pay instead. Here is my thinking on this:

My problem with "auto pay" (which here means "allow somebody to pull money out of your bank account whenever they feel justified in doing so") is that you don't have control. If you need to adjust how much or when that payment gets pulled (or stop the payment all together) you are at the mercy of the entity wanting your money as to if you can make those adjustments and how quickly. It's in their interests to take your money whether you want them to right then or not.

There are a bunch of things that could happen that would cause you to need to make adjustments to your payment. If you are at the mercy of someone pulling money from your accounts, you have less control than you may need.

Take a few minutes to consider situations where you may not have enough money in your bank account because something happened (Payroll delays, Account frozen by a Collector with a Court Order, you had to pay cash for an emergency service, etc). My favorite example being an "auto pay" that double pulled a payment because of a computer glitch. Which caused an overdraft, which caused overdraft fees, which caused insufficient funds for other payments, which caused bounced check fees. That took a lot of time and phone calls to sort out. That is not something I intend to relive. "Auto pull" means bouncy, bouncy goes the payment.

I use my bank account's bill pay feature and set up automatic "push" payments to those that I want to "auto pay". I have better control of what, when and if payments happen. As insurance that you won't be late with credit card payments set up a recurring bill pay for your minimum monthly payment on the cards you use. You'll never be late and you just pay the balance (minus your minimum payment amount) manually as you would normally.

Also: If you don't have a Checking Line of Credit/Overdraft Protection on your checking account you really should see about getting one. It will save you from overdraft fee snowballing which is extremely expensive.

Re: When Did Credit Card Banks Start Offering Autopay?

CreditInspired — Thu, 21 Oct 2021 10:37:02 GMT

@10022016 wrote:
Well, I don't see how it's a win-win situation since if you miss a payment, they can skyrocket your interest rate.

This response doesn't compute related to your initial question. And, when one agrees to accept a credit card, the TERMS specifically spell out the penalty rate if a payment is missed, which can stay in place permanently if a CCC decides to do so. So the onus is on us to make sure minimum payments are made when due.

Now, granted, anyone can have a hiccup, but the way I make sure this doesn't happen--I check my bank and credit card accounts every single day--no exception. No kidding!

Now, I don't use autopay (pull), but I religiously use bill pay (push) for all my bills--CCs, loans, utilities, cell phone, even my trash guy. I love the eBill feature. Every month, I automatically get an eBill from all those listed, which populates in my checking account's "payment due" section. When I schedule payment, it moves to "payment pending" section. If I change my mind and decide nope, I want to pay it another way, it reverts back to "payment due." It stays there until it's paid and will turn red on date payment is due if not scheduled for payment. Or let's say I decide to call in the payment. There's a dropdown to "file" the payment with a comment box to select "how it was paid." Once paid, it moves to the "processed' section.

I'm not going to lie though, when one has several bills, it does take all the tools in your toolbox to make sure you don't miss a payment. You just have to find the one that works best for you.

Re: When Did Credit Card Banks Start Offering Autopay?

SoCalGardener — Thu, 21 Oct 2021 17:44:29 GMT

@CreditInspired wrote:
Now, granted, anyone can have a hiccup, but the way I make sure this doesn't happen--I check my bank and credit card accounts every single day--no exception. No kidding!

Same here!! On my browser's bookmark toolbar, I have a folder called 'Banking' and it contains the login pages of EVERY SINGLE account I have, anything related to finances. So, for example, BofA, Amex, Credit Karma, Citi, Discover, Experian, etc. I just go through, alphabetically, the whole list every day--except for accounts that i KNOW haven't been used lately. With those, I check them about twice a week, just to verify there's still a $0 balance. I also have alerts set up on ALL my accounts, for everything from any sized purchase to payments due to payments received, so if I noticed that I HAVEN'T received an alert I should have, I know to look into it.

BTW, I filled out a survey recently about financial products, and it asked 'in the past 3 months, how many times have you' and it had choices like 'logged in using a computer,' 'logged in using a smartphone app,' and so on. Three months? *numbers crunching in my brain....* At least 90 just for laptop. At least 90 just for smartphone. Toss a few more in because it's not unusual to check an account(s) more than once in a day for some reason. So I entered '200' as my response. It wouldn't accept it!! It said the answer had to be 90 or less.

Re: When Did Credit Card Banks Start Offering Autopay?

Have1 — Fri, 22 Oct 2021 07:38:52 GMT

@SoCalGardener wrote:
@CreditInspired wrote:
Now, granted, anyone can have a hiccup, but the way I make sure this doesn't happen--I check my bank and credit card accounts every single day--no exception. No kidding!

Same here!!

Me too. When I was running my business every morning I sat down at the computer with my coffee and reconciled all the transactions from the day before into my accounting software. Some scumbag stole my business debit card info from a vendor and I caught the two charges they made (in grocery stores in Europe) before the transactions had even cleared. After I closed the business that habit transferred to my personal accounts.

I do not have any banking apps on my phone and I just can't see any reason to. I cannot think of any time in my life that I have thought "Gee, I'm out of the house doing something. I should check my bank account." I also hate trying to do anything complicated on a cell phone. Reading, playing simple games, looking at emails, sure. But actual research or writing anything of consequence? No.

The experience of trying to do anything "real" on a phone reminds me of trying to build a ship in a bottle: It can be done, but why would you want to other than for the challenge? I realize there are a lot of people for whom their phone is their only computer. I feel my life would be significantly less enjoyable if I was one of them.

Re: When Did Credit Card Banks Start Offering Autopay?

CreditInspired — Fri, 22 Oct 2021 08:24:18 GMT

@SoCalGardener wrote:
@CreditInspired wrote:
Now, granted, anyone can have a hiccup, but the way I make sure this doesn't happen--I check my bank and credit card accounts every single day--no exception. No kidding!

Same here!! On my browser's bookmark toolbar, I have a folder called 'Banking' and it contains the login pages of EVERY SINGLE account I have, anything related to finances. So, for example, BofA, Amex, Credit Karma, Citi, Discover, Experian, etc. I just go through, alphabetically, the whole list every day--except for accounts that i KNOW haven't been used lately. With those, I check them about twice a week, just to verify there's still a $0 balance. I also have alerts set up on ALL my accounts, for everything from any sized purchase to payments due to payments received, so if I noticed that I HAVEN'T received an alert I should have, I know to look into it.

BTW, I filled out a survey recently about financial products, and it asked 'in the past 3 months, how many times have you' and it had choices like 'logged in using a computer,' 'logged in using a smartphone app,' and so on. Three months? *numbers crunching in my brain....* At least 90 just for laptop. At least 90 just for smartphone. Toss a few more in because it's not unusual to check an account(s) more than once in a day for some reason. So I entered '200' as my response. It wouldn't accept it!! It said the answer had to be 90 or less.

That last paragraph tickled my funny bone 🤣😂😆

Re: When Did Credit Card Banks Start Offering Autopay?

SoCalGardener — Fri, 22 Oct 2021 17:18:53 GMT

@CreditInspired wrote:
@SoCalGardener wrote:
@CreditInspired wrote:
Now, granted, anyone can have a hiccup, but the way I make sure this doesn't happen--I check my bank and credit card accounts every single day--no exception. No kidding!

Same here!! On my browser's bookmark toolbar, I have a folder called 'Banking' and it contains the login pages of EVERY SINGLE account I have, anything related to finances. So, for example, BofA, Amex, Credit Karma, Citi, Discover, Experian, etc. I just go through, alphabetically, the whole list every day--except for accounts that i KNOW haven't been used lately. With those, I check them about twice a week, just to verify there's still a $0 balance. I also have alerts set up on ALL my accounts, for everything from any sized purchase to payments due to payments received, so if I noticed that I HAVEN'T received an alert I should have, I know to look into it.

BTW, I filled out a survey recently about financial products, and it asked 'in the past 3 months, how many times have you' and it had choices like 'logged in using a computer,' 'logged in using a smartphone app,' and so on. Three months? *numbers crunching in my brain....* At least 90 just for laptop. At least 90 just for smartphone. Toss a few more in because it's not unusual to check an account(s) more than once in a day for some reason. So I entered '200' as my response. It wouldn't accept it!! It said the answer had to be 90 or less.
That last paragraph tickled my funny bone 🤣😂😆

Thanks! I realized after posting that it's actually not clear--in my head, it was perfectly clear what I was THINKING, but I didn't type it out that way. I meant JUST my BofA account. 90 times per day on laptop, etc., JUST for my BofA account. The survey asked about each individual account, and the one it rejected was BofA with 200. (That was the first card they asked about; I'm sure the result would've been the same on all remaining cards, too, but I didn't waste time trying. I just put '90' and let it go at that.)

Re: When Did Credit Card Banks Start Offering Autopay?

SoCalGardener — Fri, 22 Oct 2021 17:27:50 GMT

@Have1 wrote:
@SoCalGardener wrote:
@CreditInspired wrote:
Now, granted, anyone can have a hiccup, but the way I make sure this doesn't happen--I check my bank and credit card accounts every single day--no exception. No kidding!

Same here!!
Me too. When I was running my business every morning I sat down at the computer with my coffee and reconciled all the transactions from the day before into my accounting software. Some scumbag stole my business debit card info from a vendor and I caught the two charges they made (in grocery stores in Europe) before the transactions had even cleared. After I closed the business that habit transferred to my personal accounts.

I do not have any banking apps on my phone and I just can't see any reason to. I cannot think of any time in my life that I have thought "Gee, I'm out of the house doing something. I should check my bank account." I also hate trying to do anything complicated on a cell phone. Reading, playing simple games, looking at emails, sure. But actual research or writing anything of consequence? No.

The experience of trying to do anything "real" on a phone reminds me of trying to build a ship in a bottle: It can be done, but why would you want to other than for the challenge? I realize there are a lot of people for whom their phone is their only computer. I feel my life would be significantly less enjoyable if I was one of them.

I totally understand what you're saying about phones! I *SO* much prefer my nice, big, 17.3" Linux laptop with full keyboard, including numeric keypad, to my 6.5" phone. However...

When I was in hospital for six months, I used my laptop to do 'real' stuff. But, I'm really, really glad I also had all the apps on my phone. If I could've focused my eyes better, I'd have been able to use my phone to make payments or whatever. I HIGHLY suggest having financial apps installed on your phone, because you never know when you may end up in the hospital like I did.

My phone sits here (on Wi-Fi only) untouched 99% of the time. I use my laptop for everything. But, at night, after putting it to bed, I do like to pick up my phone and cycle through each financial app, just to look. I don't *do* anything, just look. I don't even do e-mail on my phone--I've used the same e-mail client for decades, on my computers, and have carried my mail with me through those decades. I can't imagine pecking out one of my very verbose e-mail messages on a phone!

But back to banking apps on phones: I find them handy, and it's comforting to know they're there in case something happens again. You might want to at least try each of yours and see what they're like, maybe familiarize yourself with each one's features so if you NEED to use it at some point, it won't be new territory.

Re: When Did Credit Card Banks Start Offering Autopay?

Have1 — Sun, 24 Oct 2021 10:58:28 GMT

@SoCalGardener wrote:
@Have1 wrote:
@SoCalGardener wrote:
@CreditInspired wrote:
Now, granted, anyone can have a hiccup, but the way I make sure this doesn't happen--I check my bank and credit card accounts every single day--no exception. No kidding!

Same here!!
Me too.
I totally understand what you're saying about phones! I *SO* much prefer my nice, big, 17.3" Linux laptop with full keyboard, including numeric keypad, to my 6.5" phone. However...

When I was in hospital for six months, I used my laptop to do 'real' stuff. But, I'm really, really glad I also had all the apps on my phone. If I could've focused my eyes better, I'd have been able to use my phone to make payments or whatever. I HIGHLY suggest having financial apps installed on your phone, because you never know when you may end up in the hospital like I did.

My phone sits here (on Wi-Fi only) untouched 99% of the time. I use my laptop for everything. But, at night, after putting it to bed, I do like to pick up my phone and cycle through each financial app, just to look. I don't *do* anything, just look. I don't even do e-mail on my phone--I've used the same e-mail client for decades, on my computers, and have carried my mail with me through those decades. I can't imagine pecking out one of my very verbose e-mail messages on a phone!

But back to banking apps on phones: I find them handy, and it's comforting to know they're there in case something happens again. You might want to at least try each of yours and see what they're like, maybe familiarize yourself with each one's features so if you NEED to use it at some point, it won't be new territory.

What if I told you that I find my laptop too tiny for regular use, too. It'll do in a pinch, but. I'm using a system with a pair of monitors (a 27" and a 30") which is just about comfortable. Once you get used to having real estate it's hard to feel comfortable in a studio apartment.

As to my emergency protocol, I have all my regular expenses set to pay/be paid without need of my active participation. The only things I have to actively cause to happen are the PIFs for my cards. If I wake up dead some morning, or get locked in a ward, my daughter has all the keys to the kingdom and my wife has a PoA.

If I am simply made remote, I can use the laptop and my password manager to log in and get things set up for the duration. My "house" phone is the one the companies have (So I can avoid them bothering me constantly. Why do companies think simply because they have your number that means you want to hear from them constantly?) and I can simply have that brought to me to take care of the TFA stuff.

I have very few applications on my "carry" phone. Some web browsers, mail clients, weather apps, navigation tools, data managers and a couple word games. I don't usually have any problem figuring out a UI, provided it is vaguely well written. So, if I had to suddenly install and use an application I think I would be alright.

I also worry, especially with banking apps, that once you agree to their terms you will be locked into using the application whether it works for you or not. And if it automagically becomes your TFA token (which I believe is one of the "benefits") there are all kinds of annoyances that can attach.

I run my "carry" phone in "Do Not Disturb" mode 24/7. If you are not in my contacts you go to voicemail. If you aren't a starred contact you go to voicemail during my sleeping time. The media volume on the phone is muted at all times: I get no audible alerts that way. I have turned off almost all the emergency notifications that can be turned off. Because:

One winter day I was driving down a snow covered road in heavy snow and my phone went absolutely mental. Blasting at full volume and vibrating like heck. So, here I am trying to drive in adverse conditions and my phone is trying to tell me something really, really, really important!!! There's no safe place to come to a stop and it just won't shut up. Now I'm trying to drive and trying to fish my phone out to shut it up and find out how long until the nukes land on my head.

The message? Oh, it was a snow squall warning. Because that is obviously something that requires a full blast warning in January in lake effect country. After that I went into settings and silenced all the warnings except the extreme emergency one. That way I will at least know about any nukes inbound.

Well, that went wildly off topic. I hope it was mildly entertaining/informative/something.

Re: When Did Credit Card Banks Start Offering Autopay?

SoCalGardener — Sun, 24 Oct 2021 23:53:51 GMT

@Have1 wrote:
@SoCalGardener wrote:
@Have1 wrote:
@SoCalGardener wrote:
@CreditInspired wrote:
Now, granted, anyone can have a hiccup, but the way I make sure this doesn't happen--I check my bank and credit card accounts every single day--no exception. No kidding!

Same here!!
Me too.
I totally understand what you're saying about phones! I *SO* much prefer my nice, big, 17.3" Linux laptop with full keyboard, including numeric keypad, to my 6.5" phone. However...

When I was in hospital for six months, I used my laptop to do 'real' stuff. But, I'm really, really glad I also had all the apps on my phone. If I could've focused my eyes better, I'd have been able to use my phone to make payments or whatever. I HIGHLY suggest having financial apps installed on your phone, because you never know when you may end up in the hospital like I did.

My phone sits here (on Wi-Fi only) untouched 99% of the time. I use my laptop for everything. But, at night, after putting it to bed, I do like to pick up my phone and cycle through each financial app, just to look. I don't *do* anything, just look. I don't even do e-mail on my phone--I've used the same e-mail client for decades, on my computers, and have carried my mail with me through those decades. I can't imagine pecking out one of my very verbose e-mail messages on a phone!

But back to banking apps on phones: I find them handy, and it's comforting to know they're there in case something happens again. You might want to at least try each of yours and see what they're like, maybe familiarize yourself with each one's features so if you NEED to use it at some point, it won't be new territory.
What if I told you that I find my laptop too tiny for regular use, too. It'll do in a pinch, but. I'm using a system with a pair of monitors (a 27" and a 30") which is just about comfortable. Once you get used to having real estate it's hard to feel comfortable in a studio apartment.

As to my emergency protocol, I have all my regular expenses set to pay/be paid without need of my active participation. The only things I have to actively cause to happen are the PIFs for my cards. If I wake up dead some morning, or get locked in a ward, my daughter has all the keys to the kingdom and my wife has a PoA.

If I am simply made remote, I can use the laptop and my password manager to log in and get things set up for the duration. My "house" phone is the one the companies have (So I can avoid them bothering me constantly. Why do companies think simply because they have your number that means you want to hear from them constantly?) and I can simply have that brought to me to take care of the TFA stuff.

I have very few applications on my "carry" phone. Some web browsers, mail clients, weather apps, navigation tools, data managers and a couple word games. I don't usually have any problem figuring out a UI, provided it is vaguely well written. So, if I had to suddenly install and use an application I think I would be alright.

I also worry, especially with banking apps, that once you agree to their terms you will be locked into using the application whether it works for you or not. And if it automagically becomes your TFA token (which I believe is one of the "benefits") there are all kinds of annoyances that can attach.

I run my "carry" phone in "Do Not Disturb" mode 24/7. If you are not in my contacts you go to voicemail. If you aren't a starred contact you go to voicemail during my sleeping time. The media volume on the phone is muted at all times: I get no audible alerts that way. I have turned off almost all the emergency notifications that can be turned off. Because:

One winter day I was driving down a snow covered road in heavy snow and my phone went absolutely mental. Blasting at full volume and vibrating like heck. So, here I am trying to drive in adverse conditions and my phone is trying to tell me something really, really, really important!!! There's no safe place to come to a stop and it just won't shut up. Now I'm trying to drive and trying to fish my phone out to shut it up and find out how long until the nukes land on my head.

The message? Oh, it was a snow squall warning. Because that is obviously something that requires a full blast warning in January in lake effect country. After that I went into settings and silenced all the warnings except the extreme emergency one. That way I will at least know about any nukes inbound.

Well, that went wildly off topic. I hope it was mildly entertaining/informative/something.

Oh my goodness!! That ice/driving/alert story had me shaking my head. I've driven on ice, and can only imagine the added annoyance of a phone BLASTING me like the world's about to end...

I understand--I mean REALLY understand--your strong preference to use a computer rather than a phone. I am definitely in that camp. You'll never find me with my head buried in my phone, oblivious to what's happening around me....maybe ending up in a fountain or sinkhole I didn't notice because I was so engrossed in my phone. *rolling my eyes* But I'm glad we HAVE smartphones now, you know?

As for banking apps forcing you to use them, no, that doesn't happen. At least not with any of my banks (they're all in my sig). Their apps are just an adjunct to my real method of accessing my accounts, via laptop. I can see various ways they'd come in handy, besides being hospitalized. For example, say that I'm out and get an alert about a charge I know I didn't make. I could immediately log in, figure out what's going on, and contact the bank to shut things down. Better than waiting until I got home!

Also, even though you're proactively making sure minimums get paid (by auto-pay), things can and do happen with that. Just peruse these boards and you'll see what I mean! So while I agree that that's a good safety measure, it's not 100% foolproof.