Expressions of Perceptions

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Last week, I received a letter from my bank’s collection department.  Upon reading it, I learned that I was charged a $20 late fee, for the past 2 months, for late payments on my home equity line of credit, and that I had overdue payments.  Unsure as to how this happened, I called the bank right away.  After all, I didn’t want this to ruin my credit.

I didn’t understand how I could have late fees or overdue payments since the loan was set up to deduct my monthly payments directly from my checking account.  The payments had been deducted from the opening of the line of credit clear through December of last year.  I had more than enough money in both my checking account and savings account to cover the payments.  How could my payments be late if the bank was responsible for withdrawing the money?

I had been paying extra on the loan to pay it off much sooner than it’s due, and apparently that threw the computer off, or so I’m told.  My extra payments apparently stopped the computer from deducting the monthly payments, which were a much smaller amount than my extra payments.

My extra payments of $250 here and $400 there still left me with an overdue balance on my $132 monthly payment.  I still don’t understand how paying 2-3 times as much as is due qualifies my payments as irrelevant, and thankfully neither did the collections agent.  She put me on hold to sort things out.  When she came back on the phone, she said that my late fees would be reversed and that it would be taken off of my credit report since the issue was due to a computer glitch instead of human error on my part.

I could have just taken a check to the bank to cover the late fees and pay my outstanding balance right away, but I’m glad I didn’t.  Had I done that, the issue that wasn’t even my fault would have negatively impacted my credit score, and I would have unnecessarily paid late fees that I shouldn’t have even been charged in the first place.

When you receive a collections letter, it’s natural to try to rush through the payment process to try to get the problem cleared up as quickly as possible, but sometimes a little bit of patience and clear-thinking will produce a much better outcome.  If this ever happens to you, try to relax and figure out the situation.  It’ll produce a much better result than fearfully paying a bill that you might not even owe.

I went to the store today to pick up a few things, but while I was there, I saw that the fall and winter clothing was on clearance, so I picked up a jacket for my youngest child and a jacket for my oldest.  After all, they were only $3 each… or so I thought.

The sign on the clothing rack said $3.  Another sign stated that blue dot and gray dot apparel was only $3.  The jackets were both on $3 racks and had gray dots on their tags.  Unfortunately, at the register, they rang up for full-price.

Usually I pay very close attention at check-out, but today the cashier had me quite distracted with some wonderful news, like prodigal son type news, and it affected both me and her.  So, when she told me the total, I paid and left, not really thinking about prices very much.  Since I’m on a budget though, I had to review my receipt at home to record my purchases, and I was surprised to see that I was charged full price for both jackets.

So, what do you do if you’re overcharged?  Had I been paying attention when the cashier was ringing up the jackets, I could’ve questioned the price right away.  Then, either the cashier would have adjusted the price for me, or I would’ve had to decide whether to pay full price or put the jackets back.  Now that I’m home, my options are to either keep the jackets that I paid full price for, or return them to the store. 

Although my budget does allow for my occasional impulse shopping, it lets me know how much money I can afford to spend on impulse purchases.  That helps me to not feel guilty if I sometimes overpay or buy something unnecessary.

So, what do you do if you’re overcharged?  That’s up to you.  Whatever you do though, use your budget!

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I received an extra sewage bill in my mailbox last week.  I didn’t stress over it much because I figured that surely it had to be a mistake.  A couple days later, I called about it, sure that I would be told to just throw it away, but to my surprise, I was told that I had to pay it – even though the account wasn’t in my name, nor had I ever co-signed for it!

It turns out that the previous tenants at my other house had NEVER paid their sewage bill.  It was in their name.  They lived at the residence.  They agreed to bear the responsibility for it in the lease that they signed.  But they never paid it, ever, the entire time they lived there.

Apparently, if a tenant doesn’t pay their water and/or sewage bills, the property owner is responsible for those bills, no matter what the lease says.  The owner legally has to pay them, though the owner can sue the tenants for reimbursement.

I did not know that.  I wish I had.  I also wish that the township had notified me much sooner about the outstanding sewage bill instead of letting the balance continue to grow each month for the entire time the tenants lived there and then presenting it to me 6 months after I had evicted them.

Nonetheless, this is a word of caution to you (and me):  Be careful who you let rent from you.  Remember, if they don’t pay their bills, you might have to!

I received a letter from my children’s pediatrician informing us that she was moving out of state.  I remember a time when she was on vacation and I had to take my oldest daughter to my doctor instead.  That visit wasn’t covered by our HMO insurance plan for my daughter, so I had to pay out of pocket.  I didn’t want that to happen again, so I needed to find a new pediatrician as soon as possible.

After asking around, I called the office of the man who will be our new pediatrician.  I was quite satisfied with the answers to all of the questions I asked and decided on him right away, but I couldn’t just start taking my children there immediately.  I’d have to call our insurance company first.

Since we have an HMO, our PCP (primary care physician) is listed right on our insurance cards.  We get to choose the PCP, but whoever is listed is who the insurance company pays for us to see.  Since we’re changing our PCP, we need to inform the insurance company of our newly-chosen doctor.  They will enter it into their system and send out new insurance cards promptly.

Such a simple phone call can be financially costly if it’s forgotten.  It’s best to get it done right away instead of scrambling to do it, and possibly forgetting, when your child gets sick.