Paying Bills Off Feels Gooooooood!

You might think I'm exaggerating... but I'm not.
Image by kongsky

In the past couple of weeks we’ve finally managed to say goodbye to a few bills that have been haunting us.  About a week ago I finally got caught up on payments to my son’s counselor.  I was sorely behind on those (to the tune of about $300), but we worked out a payment plan to get me caught up so he could continue seeing her uninterrupted.  I’m finally caught up now, so I only have to worry about the $10 copay when he goes to see her. 

The second big one was a medical bill that had gone to collections.  This collection agency is absolutely vicious.  A lot of financial advice online will tell you not to worry too much about collection agencies because the worst that they will do is call you and threaten you but won’t actually do anything.  Not true with these guys.  They don’t waste any time.  Two phone calls and you’re being served and they are getting ready to garnish you.  They are also difficult to negotiate and create a payment plan with.  “My way or the highway,” is their motto.  But this week we will finally be making our last payment to them, and we can cross off a $650 bill.

We also just paid off a $360 bill that we had been chipping away at.  This one was the result of a payday loan that we’ve been paying off for what seems like forever.  A word of advice?  NEVER.  NEVER EVER EVER get a payday loan.  NEVER.  They are practically impossible to pay and will only make the situation worse.  Here, have another NEVER for good measure.

It feels great to put these bills behind us.  It really feels like we’re making significant progress.  What are we tackling next?  A $700 bill that’s been bothering me and the power bill that’s been building up.  Unfortunately, when we fell behind on the power bill, they felt like the best way to solve the problem would be to charge us another deposit.  Which effectively doubled the power bill.  How helpful.  If we pay the power bill on time for the next several months, they’ll refund us the deposit, so I guess we better get cracking.