Frugal Friday: Bill Problems

I recently had a problem with our internet bill (Road Runner). I'm still not sure what exactly happened, but I pay my bill online each month (to save on stamps and such) and apparently our payment hasn't gone through two months in a row. I'm not sure if the problem was an input problem (my fault) or a system problem (their fault).

I found the problem by mistake. I was checking our checkbook against the online bank statement and noticed two payment weren't taken out. I got on my internet account and checked and my bill was $117 (normally 27)!! I quickly called Time Warner Cable. They tried to tell me the electronic check bounced twice. I had no notice of it, no online notice, nothing showed up on the online account. Something was fishy. I called the bank... no such payments had ever been submitted! Back to TWC. After being transferred twice I finally got a lady who ALSO couldn't tell me what happened. At this point I think I'd been trying to solve this problem for an hour and I was done. She offered to drop one of the late fees and because I had never received or kept the online confirmation email/number I couldn't prove anything so I took her offer.

As of today, my bill was still high, I didn't see where she removed a fee, but I'm going to check my next paper bill and if they don't fix it, you can be sure I'll be calling again and I probably won't be so nice about it this time. I normally love our internet connection. We have Road Runner Lite ($27/mo) and I usually don't notice too much of a difference from regular Road Runner. Normally I would recommend it to you, but after this ordeal, I'm not so sure about Time Warner. If they don't resolve this problem, I may switch.

My advice is two-fold. Always call and talk to people, whether you actually owe them money you can't yet pay or there is a problem. I've always been told that speaking with someone (especially when you can't pay a bill) will always get you futher than you think. Credit card company in particular are quick to dismiss fees and work with you if you just CALL and talk to them. Explain your situation, etc. My second peice of advice is to keep ALL of those annoying little messages and emails they send about payment confirmations. I just created a folder in my email account for "Financial" emails. You never know when you'll need them and it helps to be organized!