Starting Our 4th Year - Continuing Fulltime timesharing

[ronandjoan]

Hi Joan,
Paying bills has been a worry for me as I'm planning a long cruise where internet access is slow and expensive.

I like your idea of setting bills up to be paid automatically through your bank account. Do you consider credit card bills among those "regular" ones? My bank's system will only pay the "amount due" automatically, not the "balance in full". I like to pay the "balance in full" . Maybe I need a new bank If I'm not being too nosy, may I ask which bank's online bill-pay you use?

Hi Judy!
We bank at Chase, formerly, for us, it was WAMU, that is, Washington Mutiual, which I have banked at ever since 2nd grade with School Banking, 5 cents every Tuesday! (What at great plan for bank loyalty!)
We watch our accounts online, can transfer funds, set up automatic payments, and use especially now, a new "Pay Bills" plan they have wherein they will send a paper check by snail mail, no charge to you, to whatever address! Just allow time for the mail to get there!
Yes, credit card bills are paid through automatic payments, too. Usually it seems the credit card company is the one which determines whether you pay the full amount or just the mim payment. And also which date to pay it. Most of our credit cards have that option to check on their websites. And/or we can also track what the credit card bill is and then request payment of a certain amount a few days before it is due. Woudl you have that option on the cruise? Or could you set that up before you leave?
For one company (BOA) we request an automatic payment of MORE than the minimum, just to be sure that it is enough (and keep them happy too!).
Both Ron and I keep track in different ways on spread sheets on our laptops.

 

[TravelinGuy]

... As for bills, ALL bills, the regular ones, like you, are all set up auto pay either from the credit card or from the bank. We do almost everything on line and watch the bank accounts on line very very often. ...
1. We have a UPS box in a UPS Store in Ohio and they can forward all mail sent there to us, wherever we are, upon request. I can either call or email them. ...

Joan, this thread has been full of really useful information, thank you! We're getting more and more excited about the idea of taking two years off and traveling the world with timeshares/points. There's still plenty to learn and figure out, but I think using a combination of WM points, rentals, bonus weeks, and maybe a couple high TP units for ongoing use, we may be able to pull it off.

I can see that long-term planning, and staying well-organized and on top of potential money-saving weeks appears to be the key. And also being flexible and willing/able to stay at hotels/motels during some weeks might also be needed.

Regarding handling mail while you are traveling long-term, have you looked into some of those "mail scanning" services that exist? My understanding is that for under $20/mo, one can have all one's mail and bills scanned and made readable/managable through the internet. I haven't used one of these services myself, but I saw this Consumer Review of some of them, and thought it might be useful for you.

http://www.topconsumerreviews.com/mail-scanning/

I loved the recent pictures on your blog, by the way. Gorgeous!