Online Bill Pay: Discussion

[KingAdrock]

I'm starting this thread so people can share their thoughts on paying bills online. Do you do it? Do you trust it? Do you pay through your bank or through your lender?

Personally I pay all my bills online, and specifically through my bank (BofA). At first I was doubtful, and I set my payments to go through well before the due date, so I could pay in time if anything went wrong. Now its years later and nothing ever has. At this point I'm so confident, if a lender ever tried to claim they didn't get the money, I plan to reply with "Well according to BofA you received the payment on XX date. Perhaps you should call Bank of America and tell them they made a mistake." I think that'd end the argument real quick.

I do not however pay bills through my lenders. Personally I have a real problem with the idea of giving creditors access to my bank account. When I pay through my bank I feel I'm in control, the people I'm paying are receiving the money when I say so, not whenever they want to after I give the go ahead. I'll send them the money, not let them take it.

Please chime in with your thoughts, opinions or disagreements.

[MidnightVoice]

Most via billpay from my bank.  The only one that has access to my account for removing money is Amex - I have the minimum taken out every month in case I am travelling

[fused]

I manually pay all of my CC bills online using my personal checking account...no auto deductions here. I feel it's safe and it saves me time and money. As for my other lenders, I'm stuck mailing my payments for my unsecured LOC with BoA and my personal loan with a local bank in Honolulu. Both of these clowns will not allow me to make online payments on these accounts unless I open up new checking accounts...like I need three checking accounts. Other then this, I love being able able to pay online.

[Anonymous]

I use it, love it and it's free-

Only one of my creditor does not take electronic payments from my CU (kay's) and they get sent a check.

My CU pulls the statements, emails me when they arive, lets me know if I have not paid them, tells me the min and statement balance, keeps the history -

[Anonymous]

I pay through the credit card payment page (unless the don't have one) and never have any issues. I have no problem with them having my bank account info.....nothing bad has ever happened. My electric company, phone company etc also have that bank info, again nothing bad has ever happened.

[Scamp]

I'm a control freak and have trust issues with auto-pays and things like BillPay, so most of my bills - cc's and others - get paid at the creditors' websites by me personally, each month.

I have one utility that charges a fee to pay via their own online payment set-up, so I finally broke down and tried my bank's BillPay feature for that one, to allow me to pay online free instead of having to mess around with mailing a check and waiting for that to clear. 

I've made two payments this way so far, and though there have been no problems that I can see, it bugs me that I can only schedule payments for the next business day at the earliest, and that such payments seem to take forever to post with the creditor and even longer to post to my paying account.  I may do one more mailed check and monitor how quickly that clears all around, as the BillPay route seems to be taking at least as long, if not longer.

[preci0uz]

I absolutely LOVE paying all my credit cards with BOFA bill pay. All the payees are saved and all I have to do is pick a date and amount. With BOFA billpay, companies usually get the money the next day!

I've never had a problem with a lender getting them money. Gotta love BOFA!

Message Edited by preci0uz on 07-27-2008 06:25 PM

[Anonymous]

I pay everything online, except the water bill, which requires an old fashioned paper check.  Even though I bank with BoA, I do not use their bill pay.  I pay all CCs, electric, gas, phone, cable, etc through their website.   I pay manually each month and use a CC (more points for me, please) for electric etc.  I pay the CC bills manually from my checking account.  The mortgage and car loans are set with automatic ACH from my checking account. 

I am happy with my system.  I have never had a problem.

[haulingthescoreup]

I have paid from the USAA site for very specific reasons, but once I have things up and running, I have always paid from the creditor's site, and I have never, ever had any problem or compromise with my banking account's security.

I don't do autopay. Instead, I am very, very (very, very) aware of my statement dates, and I know which cards get paid from the first paycheck of the month, and which from the second, and which involve family expenses and are paid once a month. This is pretty non-negotiable on my part, because I simply don't trust things to hum along in the background, even though they'd probably be fine. My only derogs are late payments, and my feeling is that if it ever happens again, it needs to be my fault, not because a computer hiccuped at the wrong time.

I haven't mailed off a check for anything in ages. I have two bills once a year that I have to pay by check instead of online, and I go there and pay in person, and get a receipt to clutch in my sweaty little hand.


edit to add: the mortgage and the power bill are drafted automatically from the joint account. It has worked without a hitch for years, but we always check within a day or two to make sure that it went through OK.

Message Edited by haulingthescoreup on 07-27-2008 03:17 PM

[Anonymous]

I pay everything (CCs, utilities, cell, paper, insurance, EVERYTHING) with Bill Pay on my USB banking site. I don't autopay anything. Instead I sit there and plug all the payment amounts in each month. It feeds the control freak in me lol. I've never had a problem with a payment not being credited the day USB says it will be. I generally schedule them as soon as the statement cuts so I don't run the risk of forgetting later. My checks are rarely used except for the occasional random check written to my child's school for things like school trips and fund raisers. Even some of those allow you to pay online now. I've had the same box of checks for over 7 years!