How Much is A Dollar Worth?

My wife and I pay our bills online. I’m guessing most of you do too. Usually paying online is painless. Today it wasn’t.

I posted this on Twitter after paying our Qwest bill online:

Screen shot 2009-12-19 at 3.51.13 PM

We were charged an extra $1 for paying our bill online. We’ve never seen the fee before, so it was a shcok. Of course, Qwest explains that one can avoid the fee by “mailing in a payment.” Let’s get honest, no one does that anymore and Qwest knows it.

How much is a $1 worth to Qwest? I can tell you it is costing them much more than the 100 pennies it’s costing us: Irritated patrons, bad publicity and a potential loss of a customer (we’ve been thinking about jumping ship for some time now, this may have sealed the deal).

Adding unexplained random fees, no matter how small, will cost you more than the fee itself. People know when they’re being nickled and dimed. Is it worth it?

What do you think about convenience fees?

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Contributor: Justin Wise

I am a religious deviant who enjoys coffee, collared shirts, spending time with my wife and son, learning about quantum physics and creatively exploring the riches of the Spirit of Christ. Find more here: JustinWise.me
  • Henry Bowman
    I am now this --> <-- much closer to telling Qwest to take my home telephone line and shove it. Fact is, I don't really need a home phone anymore, and since they've been taking their sweet damn time getting DSL to our community, I say screwem.
  • Grant
    Justin, I am so mad with Qwest, that I emailed them and asked them what in the world this is all about, that I had never seen this before, and they had never even mentioned a new fee would be coming down the pike! I think that is the way they wanted it, to sneek it in. I told them that I "WILL" be dropping Qwest. Like you, my wife and I have thought about doing the "keeping just the cell" phone thing. Both our boys have cell phones, and we each have one, so why have a landline now. This has- as you said, just "Sealed the deal!!!"
  • Karen
    This is a low-ball way to increase their revenue stream which doesn't make sense--just another way to screw the consumer. It's not the dollar, it's the idea of it--it makes me angry!
  • Doug Lyseng
    I have been a Qwest customer for over ten years and I have been very happy because Qwest use to treat their customers right. Being a computer consultant I have also recommended Qwest to many of my customers over the years as they were the best of the thief’s who advertise one monthly charge and then add another $20 or $30 in fees. Starting a couple of years ago they started adding a fee for this and a fee for that until Comcast is now starting to look good to me.
    This latest “convenience fee” is nothing more than their way to get more money out of our pocket. It is Qwest’s way of saying “I know the economy is bad and you are having troubles paying rent and feeding your families and I feel for you but do you know how much it costs to heat our CEO’s 10 bedroom homes?”
    The “Convenience Fee” is bogus, it costs Qwest much more to print and mail a bill, then to hire people to open and process a handwritten check. Not to mention all the bounced checks that on-line payments alleviate I say Qwest should drop my bill by a dollar instead of raising it for me making it easy or let’s say “Convenient” for Qwest to processes my payment.
    I paid my Convenience Fee last month and then I changed to paper Bill. As I sit here writing a check to Qwest and putting a 45 cent stamp on the envelope I realize that this old school snail mail is pretty “Convenient” and it just saved me 65 cents.
    I say we all call their bluff and all go to paper billing and see who it is more inconvenient for them or us!
  • Don
    Read the 'Rationale' portion of Marie Larchick's (Regulatory Support Manager, Qwest) letter. What is the ACTUAL rationale? Who knows???
    http://tabb.qwest.com/PPNB.NSF/dc8f684caffe8bcb...
    She includes info on how to avoid this egregious fee as well.
  • Don
    I also pay all my bills online, have done so for years. Qwest management would have been smarter to add this fee in their billing system rather than be so blatant about it. Indeed, it will cost them in the long run. I usually pay all my online bills directly with each service, but this one is going to be through Check-Free and avoid their graft!
  • imadunnawityu
    Just paid my Qwest bill online today and discovered the same 1.00 fee. Some might say it is just a dollar but when added to all the other small fees Qwest has, their service is just not worth the costs. We will be jumping ship as well when contract is up this year.
  • Lord Drakken
    I just saw this as well, and honestly I can't stand qwest. For years my online payment service wasn't an option because myaccount always said billing wasn't available - customer service kept putting me through loops, eventually I had them open me a new myaccount and now it works. Then soon after this fee happens. I am going to just start paying them with my banks online payment feature - but seriously - I wish Bresnan would lower their prices so I could just switch to them - and realize that requiring triple play to give a discount is a bad idea.

    Overall I think I wish I lived in Japan - The US is just turning into a cess pool of corruption and greed when it comes to large companys like qwest.

    BTW, the point is for over half a decade customers have not had this fee, so it is a slap in the face.
  • Joy
    I just paid our Qwest bill online & noticed that "convenience" fee. I think that the word CONVENIENCE was used because it was more convenient for qwest to bring in extra revenue this way than to restructure their billing fees. :) Annoys me... I'll be sending checks.
  • They had to go and make it difficult, didn't they?
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