Once, I think in the late 90s, I was subscribed to pay TV, which included a $2 fee for every monthly bill to cover the costs of sending me the thing. When I terminated my account about 6 months later due to a lack of interesting program content that I hadn’t already seen over and over and over, I received a final bill of $2 which consisted of $0 owed for the subscription and $2 for the fee to send it to me. I promptly phoned them and told them where they could stick their final $2 fee and they promptly wiped it from my account. It wasn’t long after that that our real estate changed hands and we had some new fees to pay. Mainly we had to start purchasing our own rent books, which we needed in order to pay the rent, and also had to pay the bank fee every time we paid it. Thank goodness we have a computer and the Internet now, as we do everything online and avoid most fees. This doesn’t help anyone who can’t access the Internet for whatever reason though, and not everyone is capable of using modern day technology.
Write and say will thanks will change over once contract up. Bet they come to the party then.
@kneppy let’s go back to the original post [quote=“kneppy, post:1, topic:6956, full:true”]
Senior citizens are the backbone of this country–do not penalize them for not being computer illiterate!! Send them a paper statement and thank them for being Australian
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I completely agree with you and quite a number of posts show an ignorance of the issues faced by Seniors when faced with Internet related issues. PCs came into popularity in the late 1980’s and since then have expanded into smart phones and tablets. Unless you were working with computers at that time, or since that time, then your knowledge about using this technology will be about zero. I know this because I spend time as a volunteer with our local council assisting Seniors to learn the basics of PCs, smartphones or tablets. Typically these are hand me downs from thier children who give them a 5 minute run through. Typically the device then ends up in a drawer until they decide they need to use the technology. The big issues faced are confusion about how they work, forgetting passwords, confusing Apple IDs with Apple passwords and email accounts passwords. It leads to frustration and low self esteem. Occassionly one partner looks after the electronic world, however when they pass away the other partner is completely lost. I had one client in this position who had about 3,000 emails in her in box! While we can generally get the client to send and reply to text and emails with basic internet searching, the concept of on-line banking is completely foreign to them and many are totally distrustful of it anyway.
Yes you are being disadvantaged and it’s not your fault. It’s the fault of our corporate buddies trying to save a few dollars without any thought to technical cababilities of thier customers. As far as I’m concerned they may as well ask them to build a rocket! Sorry you’re in this position, but trust me you’re not alone. I empathise with you’re position and hope that commonsense prevails and the utility companies will give some relief to Seniors in the future. I’m not very optimistic however because clearly the problem is underestimated.
Perhaps @BrendanMays or other Chioce staff may have some advice for you. Cheers.
They can still have a paper statement if they want they just pay for it. Everything if life costs.
Before the widespread adoption of the WWW they didn’t charge for paper statements and everyone got one, their cost of production and postage it was simply built into the price, nowadays arguably the cost is not built in and only the users wanting them pay extra.
@tndkemp You read like you are OK with making the least able to deal with technology, and probably the least able to afford another few dollars a month, pay for the privilege of getting and increasingly even paying their bills. Is that actually what you meant?
@tndkemp, if that was the case shouldn’t the cost have gone done for those who elected to receive the bills via email rather than the cost go up for those who elected to keep receiving statements via the post. Irrespective, you miss my point which is we have a substantial number of people in the community who are simply incapable of paying bills received via email. It is, in my view, blatant discrimination for profit.
Arguable the cost of production of paper statements and their handling and postage is now removed for the majority of users the ones who receive electronic statements. I did’t miss your point as I advised for those people who cannot use the technology to get electronic statements they still have an option to request paper statements and they will pay an additional fee to cover printing, handling and postage.
On reflection maybe I did miss you point, as it seems to me that your main argument requires that the paper statement production by the relevant company must be cost free for the person who asks for it and therefore the attendant costs are absorbed by that business.
If that is your point then no business can absorb a cost ongoing without a commensurate offsetting income, its irrevocable economics, it will go broke. So necessarily that cost will be inputed back and borne by all the consumers who use said company.
Sort of like socialism?
So all consumers who use said company must pay extra for the production of paper statements for the small minority.
In capitalism extra costs for a service is normally met buy the person demanding the service, its called User Pays.
BTW my father who is 87years young uses a computer daily and as far as I know receives his statements electronically even has a PayPal account and buys off ebay regularly, so it is not out of the realm of the elderly.
I have a rellie in her 70’s who despite years of repeated “training” and “hand holding” has yet to master email. To each their own ability.[quote=“tndkemp, post:48, topic:6956”]
User Pays.
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So capitalism is predicated on every man for himself, able or not. I see.
Capitalism in its rawest form is the law of the jungle, and the law of the jungle has served in the natural world for a few billion years serving evolutionary life to endeavour to improve and taking advantage of every opportunity in nature.
However well meaning the invention of socialism has meant to be, but experience has shown that it invariable fails because in its purest form it undermines incentive, and incentive underpins human behaviour.
Take away incentive to improve our life and people wouldn’t get out of bed to get educated, go to work, to buy a car or house have children etc…
The Chinese have shown that socialism failed to lift the masses out of poverty, once they introduced profit motive and private wealth and capital ownership their economy has grown at a staggering rate lifting hundreds of millions out of poverty, irrespective of the what the brand of government is.
@tndkemp I was not after a lecture on economics or politics, I was looking for how you perceive those on the margins of life. I think you have answered, although indirectly.
40+ years ago, my dentist gave you 50c off if you paid on the day. “So you charge people more if you have to send them a bill?” I said. “No, it is a discount if you pay now”. Sounds much like the discussion on paper vs electronic bills of today??
As one of those mostly computer illiterate oldies, I THANK YOU Aaaaaa for your understanding and empathetic posting on this topic.
Additonally, as a WARNING to others, just wait until your older relation who has arranged for everything to be done electronically via his/her email address DIES.
Most use free email addresses connected with their ISP (internet provider). As soon as they die and you cancel their telephone account – you instantly lose all access to that email account – and to all of the very important statements and notices etc. which are sent to that email account. My wife has experienced this recently with the death of her remaining parent, who prided himself on being computer literate. But he had an ever-changing array of user IDs and passwords written on scraps of paper, in notebooks etc. , from which it is almost impossible to ascertain which were the relevant ones for each account. He had dealings/accounts with so many organisations which we had never been aware of; and we are still trying to sort out his overseas matters – he had EVERYTHING done via his former email address. As a result I am staying with paper, so that there will be a paper-trail for my kids to follow. Oh, and for those who say “print it out”: my wife’s father deemed that to be anti-technology! ha ha.
No thanks and risk the spam filter? Paper statements is part of the deal in the beginning of any contract and if they change, then I am entitled a discount as much as they say it costs them…Besides a statement in my letter box reminds me to pay in time,instead of chasing emails from multiple organisations all over the place…Tax returns ? You need paper statements …And if you think you will save the world by going electronic,sorry you are wrong …
You can check the spam box, fyi.
You should probably read the fine print for every contract you own to confirm this.
What is the difference between paper and electronic mail, again? Either mode is recieved in one location, then you choose what to do with it from there. Anything you can do with paper mail you can do with electronic mail.
Simply going electronic is not the silver bullet, but it is definitely an important step in the process of achieving sustainability.
Like electric cars ? Solve one problem and create another?
From YourLifeChoices comes this interesting article about paper statements:
https://www.yourlifechoices.com.au/finance/finance-news/moves-to-outlaw-fees-for-paper-bills
And this is Mr Wilkie MP’s speech in Parliment about the Bill:
And here is the link to the “Keep Me Posted Campaign” referred to in the Speech (and well worth reading even if you don’t agree with their point of view).
What does your computer or your phone use so it works electricity ? You will save the world right? Wrong … Read the fine print? Do you always except whatever they come up with? I don’t …What happens if in the future something happens and you want to go back but your computer karked it and all your emails have gone ? Paper statements you can file them forever emails you can’t…They seen you coming…If I was to back up the emails this is another cost I have to pay for in addition to the bill… Then I have to print the statement to file it, another cost that was part of the deal but now I have to pay for…
That is not technically accurate. If you have a generic email account the emails could well outlast your lifetime, save for major corporate actions that one needs to watch for. If you use your ISP/RSP email system, you shouldn’t because once you are gone, you are gone and they don’t keep your data. If you download email via POP as some of us dinosaurs do, they are captured in our backups that are no more or less difficult to manage than a portfolio of decades of receipts and other printed material. Some receipts are on thermal paper and they fade. Some receipts are on laser print and last as long as the paper. You cannot tell unless you review them all periodically.
The message is you name your poison and enjoy it.
http://dilbert.com/search_results?terms=Bill+Gates+Towel+Boy
