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?"

Comments

Problems happen no matter what...

[-=[Dr. AJAX]=-]

I think mistakes could be made either way. Personally, I'd be checking both against my own records rather than errors between the two version of the statements.

I won't give them the satisfaction.

[digitalvengeance]

My credit card provider has been trying to get me to go with online billing for a while now, and to be honest, it would be easier for me - but I just won't give them the satisfaction.

They save money when you choose to get your bill online only, and so they refuse to allow me to get my bill online and off, though that would be truly customer-centric. So, until they offer to give ME a portion of the savings from mailing every month, they'll just have to keep licking envelopes.

Josh.

Re:I won't give them the satisfaction.

[hawkstone]

they refuse to allow me to get my bill online and off

I do almost all of my bills online. Interestingly, my credit card company allows me to keep getting my bill in paper even though I pay the bill online. (It's not that interesting in that they're not the only ones doing this for me, but judging from this comment, I'm guessing it's not uncommon to disallow it.)

Here's the problem, though. They keep "offering" to stop sending me my paper bill. First question: why would I want to stop receiving it? It's an automatic reminder that it's due, it leaves me a way to pay by check if I change online banking companies, and it's a nice double-check that they're not screwing me.

Continuing on: when I choose to stop receiving my paper bills (by a simple mouse click online), they won't allow me to go back to receiving them. I might be able to do so if I sent them a letter or something, but still.... Zero incentive to stop receiving the paper versions.

Digitally Signed Bills

[Knetzar]

I just with companies would send out digitally signed paperless bills. That way one could keep them on CD and use them to show that a mistake was made (if one was made). Until that happens I will continue to keep paper bills.

Although now that I think about it, I audit stuff as soon as the bill gets sent to me (ok, so in my world that's a few weeks), if there is a problem I call and fix it right away. Whats the difference between paper and email when I call to say that my bill is wrong? For everything (except for maybe banks) you should have proof in another account, such as to prove you paid your credit card bill, just check your bank statement.
Ok, now I'm confused about what I should do.

lazy

[jptechnical]

Ever heard of PDF995? At the least you could pdf your statements. There are a number of ways of storing your statements. If you cant get your statements from 6 months ago because you didnt save them it's your fault, not theirs.

I am lenient in consideration of your low slashdot number ;-)

You just wait....

[HotNeedleOfInquiry]

Until you get hepatits from that doughnut you bought. Then you'll wish you had a receipt so as you can sue the doughnut maker's pants off...