Advice on Organizing Bills....PLEASE :)

Bank of America offers free online bill pay with a checking account. You can request automatic billing notices. You'll get an email telling you the AT&T bill is x dollars and due on x date. You can schedule the bill to be paid on any date that you choose. You can also pay individual people. I love the ease of it. Plus I have no bills with personal information sitting in my mailbox all day. It also keeps a complete record online of all the bills paid. That has come in handy if I ever have to prove that I made a payment. The main thing is that you decide when to pay the bills.

Most banks offer bill paying services. Wells Fargo charges $6.95/month. You go online and pay the bills when you want to (or you can set it up automatically for the smaller ticket items). It's a real time saver.

Hi A.,
I too, am the bill payer in the household! (But aren't all moms?) I don't think my husband has even *seen* our little bills book in years and years! Anyway, as to how we pay our bills, we completely do it online. Saved us a lot of headaches, stamps, envelopes, and checks over the years. When we started it took us a while to set it up and get used to it, but once we were up and running it only took about an hour max to complete all our bills. So - we don't do billpay through our bank account at all. What we did was to go to each of the websites for all our bills (credit cards, charge cards, electricity, utilities, etc) and then setup online accounts. From there we can indicate a bank account to pay from (we never do automatic payments) and sign up for paperless statements (we hop online if we need to see a statement). This 1) lessens the paperwork we get each month in the mail and 2) makes it easy for us to see any statements (plus you don't need to ever store any more paperwork!) The downside is you need to record a few things: we got an accounting journal and listed all our online accounts (charge cards, credit cards, cell phone, utilities, etc) - for each bill we have the login & password next to it so we'll never forget. For each month, there's a column so we can just place a checkmark and write down the confirmation number we get when the bill is paid online. Yeah, sounds complicated, but now dear hubby can pay the bills anytime and we have a running record of what we paid each month and quickly compare if we're spending more each month on something. Granted, we still pay our landlord by check, but we keep asking when he's going to let us pay him online! Haha.. good luck!

I work full time (night shift) and have a 2 year old. I bank online (free of charge) and can pay all bills online as long the account is set up in my "bill pay" section, this takes about 2 minutes to set up each account (Pg&e etc). Once the account is set up its there until i remove it. I can then decide my payment to the account every month (and every month can be different) and choose the date I want the money to leave the account. So I might pay the bill on the 1st, but the actual pay date when the money leaves the account could be 2 weeks away. If you pay through the biller (Pg&E) you'd have to go through the biller's website, which I find cumbersome, so I go through the bank instead and can pay several bills at once that way and check on the bank balance too (the whole process only takes 5-10 minutes) . I have never had any security issues with online banking. hope this helps!

An effective method I've used is an accordian type file numbered 1 through 31. It's called a "Desk File", made by Smead (UPC 89234 No. C34). Place the bill to be paid behind the date you SHOULD pay it so it will be on time. Each numbered page has two holes cut out, so you can see if a bill is in there. Take a peak at the file regularly. You can keep it on the counter, a desk or a drawer.

I stopped using it when my schedule got crazy (sounds counter productive to have done that), but you've reminded me of how organized I felt when I was doing it (thanks).

I open the bills when they come in the mail, get rid of the excess paper, and place the bill with the return envelope for payment in the desk file.

I never did get into the computerized versions of such bill paying methods to keep my husband and I on the same page financially as you are seeking - but if you find a dream solution let me know!

~ Wife of 1, Mom of 4 (;0)

AH! The bills organizing! I do this! I have found that getting a filing caddy (Target is the best place! Plus, Wal-Mart is even better! Office Max and Office Depot are worth the try!) is the best for me. I get the bills and staple them. If you mail them, use a paper clip! File them in the caddy after a bill is paid. Or if you have a day planner, mark the dates that the bills are due. You can look ahead and know.
Filing caddy and day planners work very well. I hope this helps!

Hi A.,

I am a working mom who also keeps track of bills too. I have a simple system that I think works well to keep any bills from being late, and to keep them out of mind for the month so I don't have to worry about them. I currently just create a simple paper "chart": I write on the left side of a piece of paper the days of the month, and then all the bills due that day, in order, and the amount due. So for example, this column would say "1st" for 1st of the month, and then below it list all the bills due on the 1st and the amount. The column would continue with all bills and due dates. Then, at the top of the page, I create a row of months, with a column for each month. This way, I can check off with a check mark in the box where the month meets the bill that I have paid the bill for that month. That way I can tell very quickly which bills I have paid for that month, and make sure I am current on all bills say through the 15th. Because I am paid twice a month, I usually pay bills twice a month (say on the 20th for bills due between the 1st and 14th, and on the 10th for bills due between the 15th and 30th). I mark on my calendar the exact days I need to pay bills. Does this make sense? It's not a budgeting system, but it is a good, simple system for making sure all bills are paid on time. Hope this is some help.