And now, a fee to pay your bill

[rpannier]

Add another to the list of far-out fees: one for paying your bill. On time.

Say you like to give your financial details to a real person rather than a machine. That'll be $5. Or maybe you prefer, or need, to hand your money to someone at the phone or cable company at the last minute to avoid having service cut off. That'll be $5.

Though the practice may sound absurd, it's hardly a surprise given today's blossoming market for creative fee finding. As companies strive to keep listed prices low and earnings high, fees have become a quick and handy back-end way to raise revenue. (See "The 12 most outrageous fees.")

snip

Telecommunications companies provide little explanation for these charges, if any. T-Mobile USA, a cellular carrier with 30 million customers and profits of $1.57 billion in 2007, would not give any reason for its $5 charge. When the companies do explain, it's like this: It costs us money to provide this payment option, so we pass the cost along to users to keep our prices competitively low.

link:
http://articles.moneycentral.msn.com/SmartSpending/ConsumerActionGuide/AndNowAFeeToPayYourBill.aspx

[lpbk2713]

1. "We don't have to care ....

... we are the telephone company."


:rofl: :rofl:

[madeline_con]

2. Our local utility tries that with the water bill.

They charge for a money transferon a third site.

I set up a bank transfer, so all they get is the amnount of the bill.

[napi21]

3. Charter Cable does that same thing. There's no charge if you

pay on line at their web site or if you write a check and mail it, but if you want to pay by phone there's a $5.00 charge! You KNOW what they're trying to do don't you? ELIMINATE PEOPLE! Machines are a one time expense and don't get benefits, don't demand raises, and other than a bit of maintenance, once you bought them, they just keep on working at no additional cost. It's those pesky PEOPLE that keep costing you more money!

[spag68]

11. Plus they work 24/7

and will never join a union.

[NMDemDist2]

4. I have a Sprint store in my little town, I took my payment into them

and they wouldn't take it. I needed a "cash card" available at WalMart (of all places)for $5 in order for them to accept the payment.

I went home, called the 800#, gave them the payment over the phone automatically then called and fired Sprint.

Funny they had no problem transfering me to a live person then! A live person who spent over 20 minutes trying to save the account by offering me everything from a new phone to 200 free minutes though. Probably would have been a lot cheaper for them to have just taken the payment in the first place eh?

[gratuitous]

6. You're the exception, and more people should do what you did

I did the same thing with Bank of America when they couldn't give me a straight answer for picking the pockets of the small depositors. Large companies count on customers being locked into their brand or their service, and hoping that you'll stay with them through custom or inertia. When people walk away from them, as you discovered, you get their attention toot sweet.

Is the hassle of changing service providers worth the $5 charge you're getting nickel-and-dimed over? Big companies are betting you don't think so. More people should walk away, and let the big company know precisely why.

[NMDemDist2]

13. it was the final straw with them actually

mostly they were pretty good but here their coverage out here sux and they started the nickle and dime crap so I went with a local company.

funny that we have a local cell phone company but the story goes that some ranchers in Clovis got sick and tired of the BS from the nationwide companies, so they got together and put the cell towers on their own land and have built a damned good network in this dog forsaken corner of the world.

:rofl:

[FunkyLeprechaun]

17. I quit Fleet (now BoA) for doing exactly that

As soon as I went back to uni, I changed banks. I asked the new bank if they charged for keeping an account and they said no (and that was exactly the promise).

You know how I knew? I went home for the holidays and never used my Fleet card (it was only for my Uni, not home). My parents got a call that I had overdrawn on my Fleet card. I'm like WTF? I never used my card!! Then I went through all my bank records and noticed the little charge they did.

When I closed my account I knew I had $10 left. "I know I have $10 left, can I have it back?"

The woman said, "No, you don't have any money left in your account." Cheeky bastards. I'm not surprised that BoA does the same thing. I used to tell the freshmen to go to Century Bank instead!

[Mind_your_head]

5. I got a ticket not long ago for not wearing my seat belt - $55 fine

I went to go pay online and at the last screen, DISCOVERED that I would be charged a $5.00 "convenience fee" for paying online.

Raped and pillaged!

:mad:

on edit: no PEOPLE involved, no extra payroll....it's AUTOMATIC, no people....the system is paid for. So whomever suggested upthread that that's the reason, it's BS!!!!

[napi21]

14. That someone was me, and I didn't mean to insinuate that it was the

ONLY REASON for the charge, but it's certainly one of them. What in the world were your other options to pay that ticket? IN PERSON? THAT'S just stupid on their part! By mail? That's stupid too because someone still has to process that payment! I suspect especially in the case of a municipality, they're just looking for a new way to make a buck.

BTW, WHERE do you live? I got a ticket for the same thing here in Ga and the cost was $15.00...and no $5.00 charge!

[Mind_your_head]

15. My other options were to mail in the payment, right after the ticket, or go to court

if I didn't show up at court, or pay my ticket, my license would be suspended.

What's the 'easy' way out? Pay the fine/ticket.

And frankly, I was 'guilty'.... I wasn't wearing my seatbelt! But I remember when all these seatbelt laws came into place. The police couldn't cite you for not wearing your seatbelt, UNLESS they had some other reason to stop you. Now, it's gone down the slippery slope of "click it or ticket".

And it's not like we Americans have "national healthcare" so we want to conserve on our healthcare costs.....so people who wear their seatbelts have fewer injuries/are less costly.....no it's not like that at all.

--------

I live in Naperville, Illinois. One of the best cities in America (according to Money Magazine).

It really is a wonderful city, btw (not perfect), but.....such is the human condition.

[Mind_your_head]

16. I think Georgia could get away with a $55.00 ticket......

who would complain? Other than on an internet board? No one. "Go for it!"

:sarcasm:

[RufusTFirefly]

7. Thank goodness corporations are democracies that live in fear of losing their charters!

Not!!!

[Just-plain-Kathy]

8. Re: "...a cellular carrier with 30 million customers"

That got me thinking about how on one day, both my husband and son received a text message from the same "wrong number".

First thing that came to mind was, at the cost of $0.25 a received text message, if the cellular phone company spammed half their customers once a month, they would make $3,750,000 with just a push of a button.

[Orrex]

9. It's absurd to charge for phone-based money transfers of this sort

ACH transactions are effectively free to the company, so the charge is a bullshit fee tacked on to fuck the customer.

Also, if I send a check, someone has to receive it, open it, find my account, physically process the check, process the actual payment into the account. Someone also has to archive the documentation for the payment, and at least one other person has to QC the transaction. How is that more cost-effective for the company?

[Swamp Rat]

10. fees = taxes

"... what did you say, you red commie pinko?"



:D

[Catherine Vincent]

12. My water company charges a fee of $2.25 for pay online.

I will start mailing in my bill for 48 cents thank you.

[orleans]

18. ahem. some credit cards used to charge $8 to pay over the phone

then it went up to $12
if i remember correctly, it's a $15 charge to pay on time over the phone--in an automated push button transaction.

as bette midler once said:
"FUCK THIS SHIT!"

[tbyg52]

19. Yeah, and the phone company charges me $6 a month

to *not* put my number in their book.

[Lisa0825]

20. My mortgage co charges $20 to pay a bill via customer service rep by phone.

$12 to pay via automated service by phone.

[JFN1]

21. I have to give my mortgage company $15 to pay by phone

otherwise, I have to trust a check to the mail (which I don't like to do) since they don't have Internet payments, and they have no offices in my State where I can make payments in person...and when I complain to Customer Service about this, they point to the contract and say, "We are allowed to charge fees..."

And similarly, if I pay my car payment by phone (which I don't since they have Internet payments) they charge $9 for that...

[undergroundpanther]

22. hmmm

if there was a way to coordinate this...
what if everyone just stopped paying bills. stopped paying until these companies checked thier greed?
Let them send out bills time and again,and get NOTHING. Sure they'd threaten but if EVERYONE with said service could just not obey,it would be interesting to watch the piggies panic when it rounds three months and nobody gives a shit or a dime to those greedy sacks of shit.

[Zoigal]

23. CREDO is our mobile phone company. They don't charge to pay by phone.

And their reps are darn nice, to boot. z