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Autopay is making us worse at managing credit-card bills

wsj.com

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Re: Autopay is making us worse at managing credit-card bills

#21

Post by Salgat »

Analemma_ wrote: post #7

One thing that has really helped me is that you can set up the Apple Card so that it sends a notification to your phone for _every single purchase_, whether one-off or recurring. Of course you can turn this off if it annoys you, but I have found it's good to leave it on: it makes CC purchases "hurt" like spending cash does, and occasionally reminds me of recurring costs I would otherwise have forgotten. Probably othe…

I started using Mint which summarizes all your transactions across all accounts which is nice. No more surprises on what is going on.

Re: Autopay is making us worse at managing credit-card bills

#22

Post by LorenPechtel »

mcast wrote: post #5

The first thing I do for any credit card is enroll in autopay. You can always make additional payments and pay off in full, but late fees and late payments are arguably more disastrous for your long-term credit than accruing interest for a cycle.

And if you set autopay for the full amount you'll never have interest. I also have e-mail notifications for any transaction above $1 since I have yet to see a credit card with notifications for all transactions.

Re: Autopay is making us worse at managing credit-card bills

#23

Post by JKCalhoun »

ricardou wrote: post #6

I don't know what it is, but autopay causes me so much mental load. Instead I go over my bills every two weeks, following the tune of my paycheck. Every two weeks I check all credit cards, pay my mortgage, utilities, etc.

Agree. Autopay is an invisible gremlin reaching in and taking money from me every month. Nickelandimeism is apparently the new economy.

Re: Autopay is making us worse at managing credit-card bills

#24

Post by JKCalhoun »

icedchai wrote: post #16
ricardou wrote: post #6

I don't know what it is, but autopay causes me so much mental load. Instead I go over my bills every two weeks, following the tune of my paycheck. Every two weeks I check all credit cards, pay my mortgage, utilities, etc.

I haven't paid bills "manually" in almost 15+ years. You waste so much time opening mail, writing checks, buying stamps, etc. I put everything on auto-pay, with the exception of property taxes (only because the city won't allow it.)

> You waste so much time

It's time well spent — making sure I am paying for the things I really need/want.

Re: Autopay is making us worse at managing credit-card bills

#25

Post by ccooffee »

Archive: https://archive.ph/20231008050640/https://www.wsj.com/person...

Cited research: https://kenaninstitute.unc.edu/wealthinequality/wp-content/u...

From the research paper, it seems that this conclusion is based on less creditworthy cardholders.

> The credit card products offered by the fintech company range from $500 to $10,000 in credit limit and 10% to 30% APR, and are generally targeted toward consumers with lower credit scores and/or shorter credit records compared with the general population of cardholders.

Re: Autopay is making us worse at managing credit-card bills

#26

Post by globular-toast »

I was confused because I pay my credit card with autopay, or at least I thought I did. Never paid a penny in credit card interest. Because for me autopay means paying off the entire bill in full. I guess here it means paying off the minimum every month. Yeah, I can understand why that's silly.

Re: Autopay is making us worse at managing credit-card bills

#27

Post by damontal »

Dobbs wrote: post #2

Not terribly surprising. The time in my life that I was most on top of my finances was when I was using the old YNAB which required manually entering all purchases and manually reconciling your account. The effort put in to keep on top of it made me hyper aware of what I was spending and where. It was great, but it takes too much effort. I don't know if better tooling could help, pointing out subscriptions and things…

Too much effort? Takes me maybe 30 mins a week. Seems like very little effort in exchange for being on top of your finances.

Re: Autopay is making us worse at managing credit-card bills

#28

Post by cwilby »

crazygringo wrote: post #11

The headline is not supported by the article. The actual truth of the article comes in the middle: > Borrowers who use autopay pay off between 8% and 17% less of their monthly credit-card balances compared with customers who make manual payments, according to the study... When credit-card customers sign up for autopay, they typically have three options for monthly payments: the required minimum, the statement balance…

Well said.

Re: Autopay is making us worse at managing credit-card bills

#29

Post by ww520 »

I only use the bank autopay on a CC that is used for stable recurring payments, like utilities, which themselves have autopay set up against the CC. The recurring payments are within certain amounts so the total CC bill is predictable.

For all other CC's, I do manual pay since I do the monthly review on the CC charges at the same time.

Re: Autopay is making us worse at managing credit-card bills

#30

Post by icedchai »

JKCalhoun wrote: post #24
icedchai wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I haven't paid bills "manually" in almost 15+ years. You waste so much time opening mail, writing checks, buying stamps, etc. I put everything on auto-pay, with the exception of property taxes (only because the city won't allow it.)

> You waste so much time It's time well spent — making sure I am paying for the things I really need/want.

I still look at the statements. Writing checks and mailing them out is pure drudgery.
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