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Online bill pay is a great way to reduce the time that it takes
for you to do your bills. Basically it makes you never have to break
out a check book and mail in your payments. This is a fantastic
service and best of all, due to competition, its largely available
for free.
As long as the bank you have an account with provides online bill
pay, all you really need is a copy of a bill or invoice that your
service provider provides. You setup up each Vendor as a Payee.
For each payee you simply enter their physical address and account
numbers. Once you have set up and verified the vendor, you can send
them money at anytime.
Each time you want to pay that individual, you just input the amount
click "Payment". Depending on how the vendor prefers to receive
money, the bank will either electronically transfer the funds or
actually mail a paper check to the physical address for you. I have
three accounts with online bill pay. I have used two of them and
they both allow me to input notes along with the checks. This helps
you communicate with the vendor so they know what services to apply
the payment towards. For example, if you have a car and home loan
from the same bank. You can be assured the larger payment doesn't
go towards the car; so they can foreclose on your house.
Once you set this up, bills really do become much less of a head
ache. Because of all I can insure most of my payments are paid exactly
on the due date. This helps me squeeze the maximum interest I can
out money in my checking accounts.
You can also setup automated online bill pay to pay a vender the
same amount each month. Since I have no bills that are the same
exact every month, I choose not to do this. This is a great feature,
if it works for you.
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