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Paperless Billing?
Bruha writes "Almost all of the bills I receive today have the option to go paperless. I already pay all utilities and creditcards online but have yet to tell them to stop sending me a physical bill even though they heavily advertise the advantages of it. My concern are mistakes they could audit out and claim were not there. Has anyone experienced any problems with paperless billing or are my worries without merit?"
I've got a credit card (Citibank) and when I went paperless I asked that they email me each month to remind me to pay it. Worked wonderfully for a year or two, and I saved a few dollars on stamps and checks. Then one month they never sent the email, and I didn't pay. They charged a late fee. Fortunately, I log *all* my incoming email, and I could prove they never sent the reminder. They decided to waive the fee THIS time, but if there is a next time I'm responsible. Yeah right. There hasn't been a "next time" yet, fortunately.
I've been using a leading online banking portal in Malaysia to pay my bills and do other stuffs like 3rd party transfers.
:)
One of the problems is that it does not show the running totals with the online statements - only the credits and debits and the most recent balance. I had a friend who had RM1000 (~USD263) 'disappear' undetected for some time from his online transfer - it was not until he updated his bankbook (that gives a running total) that he noticed something amiss. Apparently, after contacting the bank staff, it transpired that the system somehow registered a bill payment of RM100 but debited the account for RM1000. So this is a warning for all you *******2u.com users out there, let the user beware