Behold, the mighty power of the Penis!
I gotta get me one of those!
crazyjoe: What do you think about my favorite “Huh?” stunt? The employee sets up direct deposit of his salary to a bank and then, without informing his employer, closes the bank account!
Lot’s of shit works here over direct debit.
However it is very usefull for a phone bill, since it’s different everytime. I also don’t forget to pay it and get charged late fees.
If you cancle/quit something, you just go to your bank and cancle the damn thing, simple.
No kidding.
I have one hanging around that doesn’t get much use - maybe we could work something out.
I suppose Jane Wyman is the First Lady!
Direct debits piss me off to the extent that they (say my ISP) can charge as much as they like to my account. I far prefer paying them money than trying to retrieve money from that pack of bastards.
Thanks Crazyjoe for your educational message.
and does it take your husband at least three months to get around to calling to sort out every little problem? :-/
If you do online banking, you don’t have worry about not receiving a bill if you change email addresses. The biller is responsible for sending it to your online bank in sufficient time to pay it within a reasonable amount of time. You just click on “pay balance” and it pre-fills in the due date. Click “pay now” and you’re done. You can access it from anywhere with an internet connection, so it’s super convenient.
You do have to go to a website to review your bill. Big deal. I’ve negated the need to have a filing cabinet in my study now.
Ha - this made me snort out loud. No, not three months - only three weeks or so. 
Behold, a numbnuts is among us! Numbnuts, be educated as to the ways of online billing. If I absolutely must allow the billing to come from the provider as opposed to being initiated by me, I set it up to use another financial instrument that allows me financial freedom, the credit card.
You see, if someone fucks up a charge to my credit card, the worst thing that happens is I go over the limit or somesuch and have to call them to get the balance corrected before my next billing cycle. If someone fucks up my bank account, all sorts of bad shit happens. Checks bounce. I incur all sorts of fees and other obligations to my money that can tie it up for weeks, and in the mean time that money is no longer available to me for things that don’t take credit cards, like my mortgage payment, or my local property tax bill.
But that only handles the emails that get as far as you. I recently got charged $2 by TDAmeritrade for sending me a paper statement (not a bill) because their attempt to send it to me electronically was rejected by my ISP who, in their infinite wisdom, decided it was spam. My ISP (Comcast) also started blocking the Straight Dope emails, so now I use a gmail address.
The Actor?!?