Absolutely Livid!!

iVillage Member
Registered: 12-05-2004
Absolutely Livid!!
7
Wed, 05-03-2006 - 10:30am

Today started out so wonderful until the doorbell rang, and there stood one of my neighbors from down the street. She handed me an envelope and said, "This came to our house by mistake. Sorry I didn't bring it earlier.", and it was my WATER BILL! Well, I open it up only to see it was LAST MONTH'S bill!! Due on April 18th!!! Oh My Goodness!!! I actually got weak in the knees when I thought of all the days/weeks that had passed since then! My thoughts ran to my Dh who is due home from a business trip tomorrow and would we have water running when he got here, and were the crews going to stop by today to shut my water off, and just everything you can think of! I ran upstairs, grabbed my purse and literally dumped it onto the floor in a frantic panic, and grabbed my debit card and rushed to the phone. I called and when the poor lady in customer service answered, I was near tears, blurting out to her that my neighbor had just brought my bill...LATE! To my horror, the customer service lady said that my next bill had already been mailed....so I had a late fee. Ugh...It was only $2.50 or something like that, but still....it should never have happened!! So I asked to pay the entire amount (last months bill, the late fee, and this month's bill that I also haven't received yet--$47.45). She processed the transaction for me, and when she got back on the phone to give me my confirmation number, I started asking about cancellation of service (she says not until it's 3 months late...whew!), sending the account to a collection company (she says not unless it's over $50 so I just barely dodged that bullet), and I asked if it would affect my credit because I really don't want anything to raise my interest rates while I'm trying to tackle my debt load, and she said that because I just paid everything in full and it hadn't gone to collections, it wouldnt affect my credit. So on that front, I'm ok it seems. I just wish my heart would stop racing!

I'm setting up an alarm each month in my cellphone to go off and remind me of the water bill just in case it's delivered to a neighbor instead. Our water company does not have consistant billing times and the due dates and mailing dates vary from month to month, so I'm going to have to set up some way to remind myself.

Man, this just made me mad....my neighbor is so lucky I didn't get my water cut off or get turned over to collections. When I get a neighbor's mail, I take it over immediately, or leave a message for them to call me if they're not home so I can bring it over that evening after they return from work or errands, etc. I never wait as long as she did. Good grief!!

Pat

iVillage Member
Registered: 04-26-2006
Wed, 05-03-2006 - 10:51am
What a shock that must have been for you, but thankfully you were able to get it under control. Its a good idea to have some way of reminding yourself of any important bills. I use a small diary to record which weeks which bills are due and an approximation of how much. It reminds me to look for the bill to pay it and stops me from getting in the same situation, I've been there too many times.
Hope your day gets better and dh gets home safely.
Love
Anne :O)
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-27-2003
Wed, 05-03-2006 - 10:53am

That is so frustrating. Last summer one of my credit card bills got sent to my next door neighbor by mistake. I happened to go over there to retrieve my DD one day and that is when they mentioned that the bill was there. Who knows when they would have brought it over if I hadn't gone over there. The bill was past due at that point, of course. At least twice a year I get mail for the people who live one block over. We have the same house number but on different streets, but I always bring the mail to them the very day that I get it. At least your mishap won't mess up your credit.

Heather

Avatar for cl_beckymk
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-19-2003
Wed, 05-03-2006 - 11:07am

Whew!!!

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-27-2003
Wed, 05-03-2006 - 12:09pm

I'm sending you magic calming vibes, LOL. Deep, calming breaths.

I really freak out about that stuff, too. For me, it's when dh's business expense visa doesn't get paid in time to avoid interest charges--even though it's like $3, and even though he pays it out of his allowance, it just gets me all in a tizzy. I start thinking, what if he gets behind and loses track of his reimbursements, and it ends up getting run through the roof, and I end up having to pay it after all our other debts are paid, and and and... ugh! LOL

Anyway, my experience has been that the regulated utilities are the among the last to report you, cut you off, or otherwise cause trouble over late payments. And one month is nothing. Even the $50 thing would be, I imagine, only if the $50 were LATE--so you probably could have missed another two payments before having that one reported.

Glad things worked out, and I'll pray your neighbors are quicker on the uptake the next time! LOL

Oh, and I'm glad to hear you've set a reminder. I actually have all my bills entered into a spreadsheet, which is how my budget is made out. But an extra benefit of that is, each pay period I go down the list and pay each item on the budget, and so if I don't have a bill, I know it, and can call and find out the amount and still make the payment. I love my bank's online bill pay feature, too, which is free through most banks nowadays. Saves me a stamp and an envelope and a check, and it gets paid on time, and it's EASY. I can set reminders, or even have it pay automatically each month (which I've actually learned doesn't work for me because I forget which are on auto pay and end up double-paying on occasion, which of course creates havoc in my budget, yikes).

Anyway, glad things worked out. Blessings,

Heather

iVillage Member
Registered: 12-12-2004
Wed, 05-03-2006 - 2:00pm
Hi, Pat. I can empathize with your bill snafu. The water/sewer bill is the only one that we havent been able to set up online yet. (no website, mail it to the treasurer, etc.). Imagine my shock when I opened the bill and it was for two months. I could not for the life of me figure out why the check hadnt cleared, until I asked DH. It seems he "forgot" to mail it (still sitting in the car under a pile of work papers!) Of course, he was sick that whole week, so I didnt get too mad. Nevertheless, I had to pay double (and some extra) toward it. If there was a way to pay it online, I would set it up in a heartbeat so I wouldnt have to go thru this again. Whomever gave the suggestion of the calendar--I thank you. The date is now circled in blue (blue=water) on the fridge calendar! Hugs. Whiz.
iVillage Member
Registered: 12-05-2004
Wed, 05-03-2006 - 4:04pm
Thanks everyone! I'm feeling more calm about this now. Since I paid my bill over the phone, I took the late 'paper' bill and crossed out the amount due and date due, and wrote in "$50.00" and mailed it today with another check for $50. That way my account will show a credit balance of $50.00 (two month's charges). I'll continue to pay my bills like normal, and if I should ever not receive a bill again or just forget to pay it, I'll be ok. :-D
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-27-2003
Wed, 05-03-2006 - 4:28pm

Hey Pat,

It's great to see you taking steps to make sure this doesn't happen again. To be honest, though, I don't think I'd send them extra money. Why? Because utilities are notoriously slow to report lates, their late fees are low, and they give lots of advance warning before cutting people off. The risk is really quite low, especially since you've started marking it in your calendar already.

I think you'd be better off putting that $50 in a savings account (where it will earn more interest than the cost of a monthly late fee) and keeping it there for the next time something like this happens on ANY of your bills. That way, you've already got the money set aside for late fees and anything else that can happen if you accidentally pay a bill late.

Better yet, if you don't already have a buffer in your checking account, leave it in your checking account and write it out of your balance. That way, if you ever accidentally overdraw your account (and who doesn't once in a while?), you have a buffer to prevent those horrendous bounce fees and NSF fees and so on and so forth.

Anyway, I just think that $50 could be put to better use somewhere other than sitting in the utility company's pocket making interest for them.

But of course, you know best what will work for your situation, and you should do whatever is best for your peace of mind.

Blessings,

Heather