E-mail billing
Yesterday (Friday, January 27, 2012) I got an e-mail from National Grid, our electric utility.
Our January 2012 billing for electrical usage was available for viewing.
And paying.
Great idea! Save a tree!
Cut out the U.S. Postal-Service.
I already do online bill-pay through our bank.
No more paying bills by monthly check.
All bill-pays are paid online.
So far, National Grid is the only one for which I do e-mail billing.
This is the second month.
Open e-mail.
“First you must sign in to view your bill.”
“WHAT? This isn’t how it was last month,” I said.
“To sign in you must first register.”
When our bill comes snail-mail, it takes about 30 seconds to open the bill and put it on my desk for processing.
So far I’ve gobbled up about two minutes.
“This is not saving me time,” I said.
I set about registering; supposedly about five minutes.
“Please enter a valid password.”
I did so, or so I thought.
“Negatory. Please enter a valid password, eight characters minimum.”
I added a character to the seven-character password I usually use.
“Negatory. Please enter a valid password, at least one capital-letter.”
I changed the lead character of my password to a capital-letter.
“Congratulations, you have successfully registered with National Grid’s online bill-viewing.”
“WOW! Thrill,” I said. In about the time it would have taken me to pay the bill, and take a nap.
“Back to snail-mail,” I thought.
“Please enter account-number and last four digits of your Social-Security number.
Okay, but “too many techies,” I thought.
Just because you can do something doesn’t make it sensible.
“Why have I gotta register just to view my bill?”
Finally our bill was available for viewing.
I printed it, so I could set up an online bill-pay with our bank.
Yet another tree falls in the forest, and it’s my paper, not National Grid.
Shift the cost of paper to the consumer.
I noticed a red button to the right: “Pay bill.”
Oh no ya don’t!
I ain’t authorizin’ some payee to process my bill-pay, and mistakenly empty our checking-account so they can buy a Mercedes with our money.
I’ve seen it happen.
A friend authorized automatic payments to repay her college-loan. It mistakenly overdrew her checking-account, and she had to straighten it out with somebody in India.
“We understand your concern.”
I’m not havin’ that happen.
Only I authorize bill-pays.
I don’t trust payees. —If anything can go wrong, it will.
So far so good.
Took me five times as long to pay our National Grid bill.
What will it take next month?
This isn’t progress when I gotta blow 15-20 minutes just to pay a bill.
Our January 2012 billing for electrical usage was available for viewing.
And paying.
Great idea! Save a tree!
Cut out the U.S. Postal-Service.
I already do online bill-pay through our bank.
No more paying bills by monthly check.
All bill-pays are paid online.
So far, National Grid is the only one for which I do e-mail billing.
This is the second month.
Open e-mail.
“First you must sign in to view your bill.”
“WHAT? This isn’t how it was last month,” I said.
“To sign in you must first register.”
When our bill comes snail-mail, it takes about 30 seconds to open the bill and put it on my desk for processing.
So far I’ve gobbled up about two minutes.
“This is not saving me time,” I said.
I set about registering; supposedly about five minutes.
“Please enter a valid password.”
I did so, or so I thought.
“Negatory. Please enter a valid password, eight characters minimum.”
I added a character to the seven-character password I usually use.
“Negatory. Please enter a valid password, at least one capital-letter.”
I changed the lead character of my password to a capital-letter.
“Congratulations, you have successfully registered with National Grid’s online bill-viewing.”
“WOW! Thrill,” I said. In about the time it would have taken me to pay the bill, and take a nap.
“Back to snail-mail,” I thought.
“Please enter account-number and last four digits of your Social-Security number.
Okay, but “too many techies,” I thought.
Just because you can do something doesn’t make it sensible.
“Why have I gotta register just to view my bill?”
Finally our bill was available for viewing.
I printed it, so I could set up an online bill-pay with our bank.
Yet another tree falls in the forest, and it’s my paper, not National Grid.
Shift the cost of paper to the consumer.
I noticed a red button to the right: “Pay bill.”
Oh no ya don’t!
I ain’t authorizin’ some payee to process my bill-pay, and mistakenly empty our checking-account so they can buy a Mercedes with our money.
I’ve seen it happen.
A friend authorized automatic payments to repay her college-loan. It mistakenly overdrew her checking-account, and she had to straighten it out with somebody in India.
“We understand your concern.”
I’m not havin’ that happen.
Only I authorize bill-pays.
I don’t trust payees. —If anything can go wrong, it will.
So far so good.
Took me five times as long to pay our National Grid bill.
What will it take next month?
This isn’t progress when I gotta blow 15-20 minutes just to pay a bill.
Labels: 'pyooter ruminations
posted by BobbaLew at 11:13 AM
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