Slashdot Mirror
What Inept Billing Software Have You Encountered?
Chris asks: "I am a Sprint customer signed up for automatic payments, and over the past week I've found that Sprint has a computer system that does three ridiculously inept things from a programmers standpoint. First, they send a 'Do not send payment...this amount will be charged' bill then a 'Disconnection Imminent' notice for the same amount, within a week of each other. When customer service is called about this, everything appears fine to the customer service rep, and they assure the client that everything is fine. Finally, the computer system shuts down the customer's cell phone for lack of payment, even if the customer has a credit card on file and has given Sprint authorization to use it. What's the worst experience Slashdot users have found with billing systems that don't make any sense?"
Aha, fnorgby, so this is where you've been hiding.
Which one of these people are you claiming to be?
Never. Let. Them. Get. At. Your. Money.
Push not pull: If automatic withdrawal or credit card billing is optional, do not opt in. If you don't want to deal with manual payment, you can setup your own transaction to send them a payment automatically.
Minimize the liability: If they insist on 'pull' transactions, opt for credit card billing, using an expendable credit card with a very low credit limit i.e. less than $500.
Paper billing: You can't accidentaly lose paper to a drive failure or virus/malware. Tangible stuff with big yellow highlighter that says "PAY ME" is easy to see on a kitchen fridge.
They took me to collections and the dink to my credit was worth it to just not pay the money they tried to extort from me.
You let them dink your credit? You should have fought it. If it's still on your credit report, you still can get it removed. Sites like creditnet.com are always willing to help people learn how to remove crap like this.