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I’ve been fairly responsible lately with my credit card, perhaps owing to my monthly-long credit card ban in April. But last month I slipped up and forgot to pay my bill on time. I paid three days late, incurring a $12.15 interest charge. Blast!
Normally, I would call my credit card company and politely ask that they remove the charge, seeing how I am a loyal customer who pays in full. But I didn’t because I truly forgot to pay my bill.
Instead of automatically paying each month, I get two reminders to review my bill online, then pay via bank transfer. My first reminder comes about three weeks before the due date and I usually ignore it because the due date is sooo far away.
The second reminder is a note that pops up in my online Google calender about five days before the bill is paid. When I get this I log in, review the charges, and set a transfer from my bank to pay in full two days before it is due. If anything is amiss, I can contest without paying.
Last month, however, my second reminder popped up on a weekend, when I rarely check my online calender. My credit card due date sailed by before I remembered. I hate to pay the $12.15, but think it is fair. I’m more worried about how a late payment will affect my credit history so I’m considering putting my credit card on auto-pay. What do you think?
June 28th, 2010 at 12:06 pm
A couple years ago I set all my bills on autopay from my credit union account. When bills come I double check the date and amount, but if I don’t see the bill for some reason (I’m a student, with a husband and four children who sometimes bring in the mail…) some amount goes out on time, and I can adjust for discrepancies later. This has been a great peace of mind for me!
June 28th, 2010 at 12:57 pm
I get paid every two weeks. I have 6 credit cards I am paying off. I pay 3 with one paycheck and 3 with the other paycheck each month. I just go online and set up the payments after I get paid. I would rather not set it up for auto-pay, because I am afraid that I would forget that the money was coming out on which day. I also have less control over which day the money is coming out of my account if I set it up for auto-pay.
June 28th, 2010 at 1:10 pm
I still would call to reverse the late fee. You’re a great customer and you made a mistake. The credit card company is making lots of money. You work too hard for your money to waste it on a late fee. Then you don’t have to worry about your credit history.
June 28th, 2010 at 1:13 pm
What’s fair about credit card interest charges? Do you think your bank ever thinks about anything except their profit? I say call them up and tell them that $12 is a ridiculous amount to charge you for being three days late and you’ll cancel the card if they don’t refund the charge. It’s worked for me the 2 or 3 times I’ve forgotten a payment date.
June 28th, 2010 at 1:53 pm
I have free online bill pay with our bank so after the paycheck goes through, I’ll schedule all the bill payments that need to be made until the next paycheck. This way I don’t forget any due dates and I know the money is there to cover to bills. As the bills come in, I also schedule the due dates in my cell phone which will also remind me with an alarm the day they’re due. At least your late fee is only $12, my late fees on credit cards are at least $30!
June 28th, 2010 at 2:32 pm
I have my credit cards set up for auto pay for this exact reason! I’ve set a monthly payment for each that is sufficent to cover at least the minimum. Then, when I receive the statement, I adjust the payment as necessary to cover my purchases but if I don’t see the statement, at least my minimum payment is made on time.
I agree with other commenters that you should at least make a phone call to ask for a reversal of any possible late fee. For good customers they’re usually willing to waive the fee at least once per year as a courtesy for any reason, including your own forgetfullness! As for your credit history, this one late payment probably won’t even be reported as many card issuers don’t report you late until you’ve missed the next scheduled payment as well.
June 28th, 2010 at 2:41 pm
I have phoned and politely requested a waver for late charges even being a true lapse of memory on my side. Particularly if I have been a customer with the business for years, they have always been gracious though stating this is a one time courtesy waver. That’s fine with me. But truly $12.00 is a lot in our budget-it’s almost 25% of our weekly food budget.
June 28th, 2010 at 2:58 pm
You should of called and asked. The worse they can say is “no.” Why take a chance that a late payment would affect your credit.
June 28th, 2010 at 3:16 pm
My experience with Chase is that they will not waive a late fee. I always pay my bill on time and one time I was late & they did not care about my past payment history, they would not budge–even when I threatened to cancel the card. Now I do autopay with them…they pay the bill the day it’s due, so it works out well,,,never miss a payment now…
June 28th, 2010 at 3:33 pm
@Laura and FrugalDad I’m starting to think you guys are right. I should call and ask because I have been a good customer.
June 28th, 2010 at 4:54 pm
I’m with Mel. I receive my bills throughout the month and stack them in a pile till I get paid at the end of the month. Then I will pay all my monthly bills electronically (but not auto-pay). That way I know the money is there and all my bills get paid on time, plus I know how much I have left to spend the rest of the month,
June 28th, 2010 at 5:29 pm
In terms of the late payment affecting your credit, credit card companies do not report late payments to the bureaus until after being 30 days late. Being just a few days late will have no affect. Obviously it’s not something you want to get in the habit of – paying late – but once is no big deal. So no worries for you on that!
June 28th, 2010 at 6:15 pm
I love autopay! No worry about making my payments on time as it is automatically deducted from my bank account on its due date.
June 28th, 2010 at 6:33 pm
@Brandy Is that true? I thought every late payment showed up.
June 28th, 2010 at 8:44 pm
Yes, it is true. Late payments are only reported if the payment is past 30 days late. You can call the credit card company to confirm. I know this because I paid one day late once and I freaked out and called the company trying to find out what to do to not have it negatively affect my credit. That’s when they told me that payments must be past 30 days to be reported. Since then I’ve also confirmed this with my bank because I wasn’t sure I could trust/believe the credit card company…!
Also, if you look at your credit report you’ll see the payment categories are ok/on time, 30 days late, 60 days late, 90 days late, etc. Anything 30-60 days late will show up as 30 days, anything under 30 days will still show up as ok.
But just because it won’t show up on your credit report doesn’t mean that the credit card company can’t raise your rates due to a late payment. Just for that fact, you should definitely call and try to get them to reverse the fee and confirm that they will not raise your rate due to this one little oversight.
June 29th, 2010 at 7:08 am
Yep, I’ll back Brandy up there (not that she needs backing
). I similarly missed a payment a couple years back and totally freaked out about it, so I called and the very nice fellow told me it really would only amount to a little bit of interest (which he nicely refunded because we were good customers) and that they wouldn’t send any of it to the credit agencies because it wasn’t 60 or more days past due. I was so relieved.
As for autopay, I thought about it, but have resisted setting it up because I really want to have a reason to check all the charges on my statement one last time before I pay it each month. So I make sure that as soon as that first reminder comes in (even though the due date is far away), I go in, review all the charges, then set up payment for a few days before the due date. I still get the second reminder, and at that time, I go back in and double check that the payment is still set up for a couple days ahead of the due date. This has prevented any further oops situations.
But definitely call and ask – as someone else already pointed out, the worst thing that will happen is they say no.
June 29th, 2010 at 8:09 am
I have some bills on autopay but only ones that are always the same amount. If a bill can vary widely I don’t because I like to keep a low balance in my checkbook since it gains no interest.
June 29th, 2010 at 11:07 am
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June 30th, 2010 at 1:48 am
I, too, once was a couple of days late with a payment for the first time ever and freaked out. I called Chase immediately to reverse the charge. No go. I got a supervisor’s name and left a message pleading to be called back. He didn’t call. I tried again a day or so later. Still no response. I finally wrote a letter to corporate acknowledging my error and stating why I was late (I inadvertently changed the order of the steps I take when making my online payment), said I was a long-standing customer, told of the unprofessionalism of the supervisor (whom I named) for not calling me back and that I expected a company of Chase’s prestige to treat its customers better, particularly customers of long-standing, and threatened to leave. In the end, the charge (a minor one) was forgiven. It was worth the time and trouble I took, but I have never completely forgiven Chase. The reason is that at the same time I set up the online payment for Visa (Chase), I also set up a payment for MasterCard. Therefore, the same accidental changing of my procedure also caused a late payment to Citi . One error was bad enough, but both upset me greatly because paying late is NOT what I do. However, Citi, in my one and only phone call, graciously and immediately forgave my error and cancelled the charge. It was the exact opposite of Chase’s handling of the matter.
So, yes, BB, call. Mistakes happen, and yours is so minor. Then please report back to us. I hope it goes easier for you than what I went through.