Who remembers when bills were due the 1st or the 15th or the 30th?

[Stinky The Clown]

Now bills can be due any day of the month. Your choices are to pay something (seemingly) every day, to pay lots of things on one day (meaning you pay early and give the motherfuckers the benefit of the float), or you pay late.

Is anyone aware of any way in which you can make your bills all due on the dates you want them to be due?

[Tikki]

1. We dumped our Sears credit Card because they were...

shifting the dates due all around. Paid it off and cut the cards up.

The Tikkis

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

2. One day too early.

The new model.

:think:

[NeedleCast]

3. Not that it matters to me since I pay all but one of mine online

but for the ease of dividing up the bills among my roommate and I I just called the utilities and asked them to change the billing date. Gas and electric were reasonably easy, cable was a little harder but they gave in pretty quick (I think they had to reset my billing cycle or something so on the day I wanted to get my bill I just paid the balance down to zero and called them and asked them to change the biling date). I only have one credit card and I rarely use it, but they also changed my billing date. Now I get everything within about five days of each other and I pay everything online except my quarterly trash/recycling bill (which doesn't have online payment).

[Stinky The Clown]

9. We pay online, and autopay online, whatever we can .....

.... but for variable bills, autopay is impossible. Not much difference in terms of time it takes to pay online or write paper checks.

[NeedleCast]

13. The convenience in not having to buy (and then find) stamps is enough for me

I just don't think we live in a world where you're going to get a 1st/15th/30th choice unless you ask for it anymore. Things move faster now. I don't think about it much...when I get an E-mail notification that a bill is due I just pay it next time I happen to check my E-mail (which is usually many times a day). My dad has done the same. He's old school and still uses paper checks for pretty much everything. He's got all his bills including several credit cards and various other things set to arrive on the 10th of each month and says that it usually happens give or take 2 days in either direction. On the 15th, he sits down and writes paper checks for them all.

So yeah, just give em a call and ask them to move the date.

[grasswire]

4. hey, you're right!

And in different parts of the city, the same bills are due on different days for the same utility companies. It's crazy. I'm always late on my cable payment -- can't figure out when it's due.

[NeedleCast]

6. Most billing cycles are based on when you started the service

Which is why they tend to be all over the place.

[GreenStormCloud]

11. That's because of the day the person reads the meter.

The meter person can't read all the meters on the same day, so one section of town gets red on the 1st, another on the 2nd, and so on, all the way through the month. The bill gets sent out shortly after the meter is read. Spreading out the bills over the month also helps keep processing costs down, as they can set up to do the same amount each day instead of a huge wad of bills at once.

Even social security, which used to send all the checks out to arrive on the 3rd, now spreads them out over the month.

The answer for you it to simply budget for the different bill times so that you have to money in your account when you need it. Just because you get paid on the 15th doesn't mean that you have to spend all your money on the 15th. If you have a bill due on the 22nd, then set the expected amount of money aside for it, and pay on that day.

[BonnieJW]

5. If you call the company

sometimes they will accommodate you and put your due date when you want it. I think Amex will do that. If you pay your bills online, your payment will hit on the exact date it is due. Banking online saves money (no stamps or checks to buy), and paper (no checks, envelopes) and you can sign up for electronic billing so your bill shows up in your email box, saving even more paper.

[bamacrat]

7. That was back before companies realized they could get people with late charges...

if they made one bill due a week after all the others but before the next payday.

[Stinky The Clown]

10. That is **exactly** my theory

It is a seemingly minor complication, but no doubt it benefits the complicators and not complicatees.

[NeedleCast]

15. I don't think this is true for utilities

One of my best friends works in the billings department for my regional power supplier (Dominion Power). I think there are several billing departments because Dominion supplies power to part of a few states. In any case, he says they do it to spread out when checks arrive because if they set everyone to a certain date, they influx of mail would overwhelm their ability to process it.

[GreenStormCloud]

12. No, companies spread them out to avoid peak processing volumes.

If all the bill for a company go out on the 15th, then they means a huge amount of processing just before the 15th. It is more efficient to spread the workload out of the entire month, with some bills going out each day.

[bamacrat]

17. So, the upside for the company is late fees. win-win n/t

[WeDidIt]

8. I do it all electronically and if possible automatically

Just manage the checkbook from there. You calculate payments hitting your account between paychecks to hit the day you get paid. You keep a higher balance at all times that way and don;t give your creditors a float.

[cyberswede]

14. I pay all my bills on the 2nd or 3rd every month.

My spouse and I are paid monthly, on the 1st. I pay all the bills within a couple days of payday. In fact, I have no idea what the due dates for my bills are, and it doesn't matter.

[On the Road]

16. Utilities Like Telephone Companies

have always had 10-20 bill dates to spread out the workload in their Regional Accounting Offices. Generally depends on your phone number.

But the floating bill date thing is a travesty.

[kas125]

18. My dad, who is 80 and gets his pension check on the 1st

and his Social Security on the 3rd noticed a couple years ago that the date the phone bill from AT&T was due kept changing, sometimes making him pay twice in the same month or owe late charges. I called and told them that he truly believes that it's a conspiracy to garner late charges from old people when they KNOW old people only get paid once a month. They finally told me to let him know that he can ignore any due date on his bill and it will always really be due on the 5th. They said that they changed his info so the screen shows that no late charges will be due as long as he pays by the 5th whenever someone brings up his account. Whether it's true or not, I don't know, but it made him feel better and each month he crosses out the due date printed on his bill and writes in the 5th. So far, he hasn't gotten any late charges and if he does, you can bet I'll be on the phone getting someone to remove them.