PC utilities forum: See you later snail mail, hello online bill paying! Advice needed.

Hello cynthia.

First I like to tell you that I have been using Microsoft Money but they don't sell it anymore. Quicken still around.
Basically is just like an electronic checkbook, you enter all your entries and schedule all your payments.
In the past I had the opportunity to have MS Money, connect to my bank and send the electronic payment information to them. However i never used that feature. Quicken is very good too.

At the beginning using MS Money, was just a replacement for my checking paperbook, but it allows me to schedule payment REMINDERS. Five days prior to the due date, I go to the Merchants website and authorized the payment to be deducted from my checking account - ONE TIME ONLY. I do not subscribe to PAPERLESS BILLING or AUTOMATIC DEDUCTIONS from any.

As many have pointed out, is difficult sometimes to decide which Merchant you can give your checking account number to. However, I have been doing it like this for over 5 years and never had any problem because as I mentioned before, I only authorized that months payment.

In this manner, Merchants are not authorized to debit the checking account, even if you happen to forget to make - say next month payment on a credit card.
You will of course get late payment fees, and your credit score could decrease if you don't keep up with setting the payment manually.

That's why I have MS Money to remind me of when and how much the payment is due.

So lets break down:

You could use your own banking institution, to schedule the payment - and this is probably a safest way being that your banking institution will issue the check for you in payment, rather then you having to send one by mail.

Or let the merchant debit your checking account. Neither the Merchant or the bank charge fees this way.

Because some banks have regulations on how much money you have to keep in the checking account in order to get FREE ONLINE PAYMENTS, - it Is important that you know the rules your bank has. They could offer free payments via check, which means you have to schedule them with sufficient time for the check to get to the Merchant.
Or they could offer you free ACH Transfers, or electronic transfer of funds for payment to a merchant for a - POSSIBLE - monthly fee. Or could be FREE if you always keep a certain amount of funds for example in combine and link accounts Savings and Checking.

For me it works just fine giving the Merchant like Verizon, or Any credit card Merchant my checking account number because I only authorized just that one monthly transaction.
I chosed to do it that way because back when I started, I wanted to avoid the montly charge from my bank for Electronic Transfer of Funds to a Merchant. And to be honest since we are all protected by Law from anyone taking funds out of any checking account without valid authorization from me. Then I am not concern, about giving my checking account.

Another reason is because with MS Money, I know exactly how much i should have in the checking account monthly to cover all my payments. If I need additional funds, I do a transfer from my Savings to Checking via my bank.

No one can touch my savings, so even if someone would try to post an UNAUTHORIZED debit to my checking, and if the banks pays it, then they better have good proof that the authorization came from me, otherwise the bank is liable.

But putting this aside, find out the rules / restrictions from your bank. For example - Would they charge you for individuals transactions / or not ? - Do you have to have minimun balances ? - Do you have to have a Savings and Checking account link for you to avoid any charges ? Does the free payment your bank offers is via a Check ? so that you can make an inform decision as to when you should issue the payment.

Remember, that your bank is not liable for late payment fees if you don't schedule them with sufficient time.

Other then that is very simple to do it either way - You schedule them with your bank - or - you schedule them with the Merchant once a month.

It may sound like scheduling it with the Merchants once a month so that I keep control of what is debited is too much work. But I have gotten used to it just the same and never had any problems.

Most Merchants can even send you an email reminder of when the payment is due, and when they have debited my checking account and for what amount.

Good Luck

Whiner!!!

I think well said geo2003. Lenghthy maybe but had to fully give good advice without being.
As I mentioned in a earlier post I use Quicken. Sad to hear MS no longer offering MSMoney. I do like Quicken better.
Cynthia. If you buy and use Quicken it wants to be the do all for you. I.E. Automatically track and real time keep your acounts updated and bills paid and store your account ID's and Passwords. Don't let it!
Go to your accounts online and download from there.

Check with your bank and set up every account you possibly can through them and DO NOT direct-pay ANY account. Any accounts you can't arrange through the bank will have to stay on snail mail. Don't direct-pay even non changing accounts. Reason? My son had direct pay for his cable and some other accounts. He moved, dropped several accounts including the cable service (so he thought) but kept the bank because there was a branch near where he moved. The cable service auto-withdrew three months worth of charges before he got settled into his new home and caught the bank action. If your bank doesn't offer this service, then either look for another bank or an online service that you've carefully checked for security, their insurance and termination agreements. So, If they fail to honor your request to terminate an auto pay within an acceptable time frame, say 72 hours or less, they risk getting canceled as well and they pay any penalties or overdrafts not due to your fault.

Next is security. BIG time! I use LastPass which is an add-on for the IE and Firefox browsers that handle your account passwords, user names, login email addresses, security question answers and you can add more details in the notes sections. You can set up several LastPass accounts through this one add-on, one for you, one for your spouse and for each member of your family. That's just one master password for LastPass for each of you to remember, and do not make them easy ones, even if you each have to write them down, which you should anyway. LastPass also generates random passwords. One more note about passwords and secure questions and the notes sections of LastPass; I'll use a question such as "Who was your first grade teacher?" and enter another random password for the answer and save the info in the notes. A hacker is going to have to take a lot of time and put in a lot of effort to crack several randomly generated answers, especially if you set the length of the answers/passwords to 20 random characters or more! See? You can apply several actual passwords to some accounts this way. LastPass also uses encryption within your browser add-on and to synchronize your browser add-on with the LastPass online data storage. Your info is secure! And that brings up another great thing about LastPass. If you are away from home and any of your computers and need to access any of your stored accounts, you can log onto the lastpass.com site from anywhere and open your account and copy and paste the info you need into the fields of wherever you need to log on to.

LastPass isn't perfect, it won't handle flash style login forms and a few very complicated or incorrectly labeled or coded Script forms. For these you'll have to manually open and save the account info and copy and paste as I described above. You'll also have to manually copy and paste the info from LastPass into the forms when you return to log on. You also need to remember to obey LastPass when it prompts you to save a site, and you can categorize and access each of your log-on sites just like bookmarks.

Oh, and there's a LastPass user's forum for questions and support as well as the premium (paid) version professional help. No, I'm not a LastPass business partner or anything like that, I just like LastPass that much! Besides, the basic package is free, though there is premium. I use the free features.

Reviewing the comments and my own I see somethings missing ... Keep your anti-virus and other anti-malware programs active and up to date. Imperative!!

And Happy Holydays to you Cynthia!

Like others here I do all my bills online through my bank. Most of my bills are recurring fixed amounts and I've set them up to take care of themselves automatically. For the few variable amount bills (eg utilities and credit cards) I key the amount in manually once a month. (The bank does an electronic transfer to the payee or cuts and mails a check.)
I download all my bank transactions to Quicken and balance my bank account by comparing Quicken to my bank statement. They're virtually always the same so my checkbook balances itself.
Someone suggested having your payees do withdrawals from your bank account. I don't do this as giving someone access to my bank account makes me uneasy. I want to initiate the transactions, even if they're done automatically.

I was like you 6 months ago and banking with checks I was the victum of identity theft twice.since I got an online checking account I have had no problems.My check goes in direct deposit I pick the date,the amount and who I want paid.You can have it set up with auto pay every month or you can change it every month.I have to tell you I don't worry about a thing,It's the best thing I ever did for myself.There are also alot more perks to checking online,too many to get into full explanation.Just try it for a month or two,you're not obligated to keep it. I wish you luck in your choice. Janet V

google Zeus Trojan and you will see.

Hi Cynthia,

I've been using Quicken Bill Pay for many years (I think over 10). It works great. I pay $9.95/mo to send 20 payments. Cheaper than stamps. Intuit holds your banking info and I have never -- knock on wood -- had a security problem with them.

You have to add each vendor only once as an Online Payee, and then you enter their name in the online "checkbook" to send a payment to them. The program is great. My husband and I set it up so we can view all our banking and investment accounts. If you like, you can set it to automatically update your investment accounts with the latest balances.

You can print out your checking account register at any time for a hard copy.

I would never go back to mailing checks.

Hi Cynthia... I still use snail mail and will continue to do so for several reasons:

1. Our mailmen/ladies, work in some of the worst kinds of weather, and I believe that their "high" wages and very good "benefits" are deserving of those who tread thru 3 foot snow drifts, wind gusts of 50+ miles per hour, pouring rain, freezing drizzle, hail, sleet, sticky humid days, and temps ranging from 40 degrees below zero to 115 degrees above. And to think they do this 6 days a week, for the price of a postage stamp. Even though those in the "higher" up positions have mismanaged the US Postal Service, it's not the mailmen/ladies fault. If we don't continue to support our postal employees, then one day we may be getting mail once a week. I say continue to use snail mail and support your local mail people.

2. I have great anti-spyware, virus protection, and a keylogger prevention programs on my computer, and I as one, still don't want to pay all of my utilitie bills (5), car insurance, house insurance, house taxes, and credit cards (4) online. In my case that would mean 12 different passwords, and 12 different account numbers to remember, and 12 accounts that someone could hack into. I for one would rather pay the 44 cents for each of those bills and have peace of mind.

3. The main reason the postal service is billions of dollars in debt, is due to the millions of people who pay their bills online. They do this out of convience, to save a few bucks a month on postage, or even laziness. Too lazy to write out a check, put it in the envelope, put a stamp on it, and take it to the post office. Sure it's quicker to pay bills online. But I for one don't want my checking account number floating around in 12 different places.

It's your choice... rather choices... pay 44 cents on each bill, or use your checking account online. Support the US Postal service and the hard working mailmen/ladies, or not. Think about it before making a decision. The next time you see a mailman/lady walking in a storm, ask yourself if you would do their job. (I surely wouldn't do it!)

Your post is more than likely accurate, but I am not positive, as I don't use my bank for anything other than depostis, buying bonds, fax's, and checking services.

What disappointed me about your post, was that you did not mention how our mail people work very hard for their wages, nor that you would support them by continuing to purchase and use stamps. Give your mail man/lady a nice big smile the next time you see them, and then remember that if you don't support your local post office, then your mail man/lady may soon be in the unemployment line along with the other 14 + million unemployed American's out there. 8-)

I support the US Post Office in any way I can. Call me old fashioned, stupid, nieve, whatever, but I don't want to see them fail, nor lay off more hard working people. Right now in my area alone, they are trying to close 3 of our post offices, one being 6 blocks from my home. Even if they do close these post offices, I will still continue to buy postage, mail my packages thru them, and drive the extra 3 miles to the nearest post office. It may be a small thing on my part, but just think what could be done if everyone helped out.

In regards to your reply:
1. I can currently WALK to my closest post office

2. If they close that one, I can't walk the 3 miles to the then nearest
post office, as it's "freeway" only to that post office

3. If they close that post office, our mail will then go from our city
to the Capital of our state, which is 175 miles away, then turn around
& come back to our city, and get delivered right back in our city. So
instead of getting delivered the next day, our mail will get delivered
3 to 4 days later.

4. You must be lost in your own city. I live in a "small" town with post
offices every 3 to 10 miles apart. Don't patrionize me for your own
city, which it sounds like from your discription is probably 3 or more
times larger than my city.

5. Your last comment is definately racist sounding, and I'm
surprised that Lee even allowed your comment to be posted. In order
to work for the post office, one needs to be a legal citizen who can
read and write English. If you can't understand someone due to their
accent, that is no reason to criticise them or be condenscending to me.

Go post your racist remarks on a political blog somewhere. Your kind of remarks are not welcome here.

USPS carriers DO NOT work 6 days a week; they work 5 days a week. They work 4 days every 5th week and 6 days every fifth week (once a month). How do I know this? I am a retired USPS city carrier. The wages USPS carriers are paid are ridiculous for what they do. Yes, I have carried in every kind of weather the poster mentioned except for 40 below zero (the coldest I carried in was +4 degrees Fahrenheit) and I felt I was being overpaid all the time. Did I take what I was paid? You bet; I am not stupid. But that does not lessen the fact that USPS carriers are overpaid.

The ONLY way she works 6 days a week is if she is carrying other carrier's routes on her scheduled day off. It is the ONLY WAY!!!! And it is ALL overtime for her. I worked for the USPS for nearly 11 years before I retired and trust me, I do know what I am talking about!! So do NOT tell me I am wrong!

She brings my mail 6 days a week. When I mentioned that it wouldn't bother me if they stopped Saturdays, she allowed as how she would like to get Saturdays off. Is she a rural carrier? Yes. Is she a contract carrier? I have no idea. Doesn't matter. She works 6 days a week.