A fantastic way to pay your bills, is online. Most utility payments, debts, and banking can easily be done via the internet.
Sign-up for online statements. This sends your statement directly to your email. Many companies actually are starting to offer you discounts, or one time cash perks for signing up. No more days of “Lost in the mail” statements.
Auto bill pay. This is a great option for your bills that fluctuate. You can set up an automatic payment to pay your bills for you. No need to even get on the computer. It’s all done for you, and you are typically sent a reminder to avoid “Forgotten payments”. Most banks offer this for free, and many companies do as well.
**TIP: Always write down your online payments in your ledger to avoid any overdraft fees.**
Now as great as it is to think about the financial gain, you’re also saving time. How much time do you spend each payday, sitting down, sorting through statements, and writing out checks? If you’re still writing checks, I bet it’s more time then you’d like. By setting up all of these options, you’re taking that stress out of sifting through the pile of paper on your desk.
Clutter. We’ve talked about the stress that comes with clutter, and let me tell you…paper clutter is one of the worst. Now if you decide to keep your statements, you always have the option of printing it out. It’s much cheaper to just print it, then it is to have the Utility company, print it, then stuff an envelope, then print the mailing label, sticking a stamp on it and then mailing it off. Save them a few bucks and often you’ll see the rewards.
Eco-benefits. Another reason to switch to paperless is to avoid all of that paper waste.
It may seem like nothing at the time, but by saving the cost of a stamp (Which is rising at an incredible rate), the cost of the envelope, and the cost of your checks, it will quickly start to add up. Imagine you mail off 10 bills a month. At .44 cents (or whatever the current rate is) per stamp, you put out $4.40, on stamps alone. Add in the .10 cents per envelope, and the average of .25 cents per check…it adds up. Now multiply that $7.90 by 12. That’s $94.80 a year that you’d save!
Save a dollar, Save a Tree, Save time! Win-Win-Win!
Great post! I can’t imagine an envelope traveling from my bank all the way to my house with all my information on it. What if that got into the wrong hands. Yikes! Make sure to set up alerts online as well so that if you get close to being overdrawn or a large transaction hits your account you’re notified immediately. It’s crazy how many different alerts BOA has.