365 True Things: 99/Bills

We put the mail on hold for the three weeks we were gone, so today what did I find in the mailbox but a huge stack of envelopes, circulars, and a few magazines/catalogs.

Most of it was junk. There's way too much paper wastage in this world. I don't even bother looking at the junk mail. I wish I could tell the mail carrier not to deliver it, but things don't work that way.

Among the envelopes were seven bills, five of which (mortgage and utilities) I paid this afternoon. The other two are credit card bills. One is still a credit from an old overpayment. I don't usually use that card, though we did use it bigtime in Norway, since it's the card that doesn't incur foreign transaction fees—so next month, I'll be seeing a nice hefty sum. The second credit card is set up for automatic payment.

I actually prefer to write checks: I like to see how much of my money is going where, and I like to have a firm idea of the balance in my checking account. If all my bills were paid automatically, I'd lose track. At least, that's my worry. I probably wouldn't. After all, knowing how much money you have is important.

I set up the one credit card for automatic payment because it's due on the 25th of the month, and my habit is to pay all my bills at the beginning of the month. So I ended up paying that one late more than once, which meant late fees. Late fees are not acceptable. So: automatic payment seemed the best option. (Since then, a friend pointed out that I could have called Chase and asked them to adjust the payment date. That never occurred to me.)

I always pay off my credit cards. No late fees, no interest payments either. It just makes sense.