Bill Me Later

With the holidays getting underway, you're probably going to be shopping a lot online. If you buy from several different merchants, then checking out each time can get tedious--registering, entering your credit card number again and again, not to mention worrying about keeping your accounts safe and secret. Recently, the ladies of WMAG were given the opportunity to try out Bill Me Later, a service that lets you pay without using a credit card, and then receive one bill for all of your online transactions.

Here's how it works. You fill up your shopping cart, then when you go to check out, you look for the Bill Me Later icon and click it (more and more retailers are participating in Bill Me Later - look here for an updated list). All you have to do is enter your birthday and the last four digits of your social security number. Later on, you get a bill that allows you to pay for everything at once. Each of us was given a credit so we could try Bill Me Later for ourselves. Here's what we thought:

Sara's Take

Before I go into my spiel, I want to mention that Bill Me Later has all sorts of holiday specials going on right now. Certain retailers are offering discounts if you use the service. I'm definitely going to be checking those out as I do my holiday shopping!

Anway... I found Bill Me Later really easy to use, once I located that little icon. At some retailers, the icon wasn't as prominent as I would have liked - they put it in a little line with all the rest of the accepted credit cards. So if you intend to use Bill Me Later and you can't find the option at a retailer you know participates, just look a little closer. You eventually will find it.

My only watch-out with Bill Me Later is the same as I would give for anybody in today's economy - Bill Me Later, at its core, is a credit system, so it'll show up on your credit report when you apply. My contact at Bill Me Later said over half of their customers pay off their balances every month, and many retailers offer 90 days same as cash, meaning no interest if you pay within that timeframe. If you do use the credit facility, she says credit is applied per transaction so it's easier to manage than a large credit line.

Basically, what that means is that you need to take responsibility for your own spending. If you have a problem with abusing credit, you can do it just as easily with Bill Me Later as you could buying with your regular credit cards - perhaps a bit easier, because if you normally would have paid with a debit card (and, thus, with cash) but use Bill Me Later, you could allow yourself to "backslide" and not pay off the whole bill. These days I'm a real stickler about limiting my own credit use, so I thought I should mention this. Tools like Bill Me Later are awesome if you exercise good old fashioned discipline.

One other thing that I liked about Bill Me Later was that they were very responsive when I ran into a couple of glitches (of my own making, not the service's fault). They bent over backwards to make sure I was happy and had my issues resolved.

Tela's Take

I liked Bill Me Later. I found it very nice to be able to check out quickly and not fill out all that information over and over. Because honestly? That's what usually makes me bail when I do my online shopping. When I finally decide what I want (because it usually takes me about eight years to make a decision), I have to REALLY want it to seal the deal and fill out all the shipping stuff, cc number, blah blah blah. So yeah, I found the Bill Me Later option nice. Very nice. And right now, I see Amazon often advertising a code to save money when you use the service. Double bonus.

I also found them very helpful when I inquired for help. It took me a minute to figure out how to use Bill Me Later--I just didn't think it could actually be THAT easy, but it is.

I didn't think much about the whole credit system thing, because I just paid off my bill with my debit card once I received it. I just basically used it for the whole "save a step" process when checking out. Like Sara, I'm watching every penny, and prefer to pay off CCs once I get the bill (if I can.)

Net, Bill Me Later could be a great asset to those who do a lot of online shopping for the holidays. Quick and easy--and who doesn't need quick and easy over the holidays?

Cara's Take

I agree with Sara's and Tela's comments. The one thing I hated about online shopping was filling out the long forms at checkout. Now it's easy to make a quick checkout without getting out your credit card. I was pleasantly surprised with the long list of online retailers that offer Bill Me Later. I got a head start on Christmas shopping was abe to pick out a few items at KB Toys, Amazon, and Toys R Us. Although Amazon sent me the wrong item, they credited my Bill Me Later account easily. Since I left the credit sit for awhile, Bill Me Later cut me a check and sent it to me in the mail. Overall, everything was great and especially convenient!

Susan's Take

I plan to do nearly all of my holiday shopping online this year. I just don't have time or patience to face the crowds. And when I do shop online, I want it to be as fast, painless and effortless as possible--that's the whole point. Enter Bill Me Later. This service takes away much of the annoying registration and payment BS you have to go through when making purchases at various online retailers. You just click "Bill Me Later" and it's taken care of. Like waving a card as you stroll out of a store, purchases in hand, and they magically get charged to your account (and not getting arrested for shoplifting). I love it!