The Best Way to Keep Track of Your Bills

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Before I was fully committed to this whole “getting out of debt” thing, I was really flying by the seat of my pants when it came to tracking my monthly bills. I hadn’t even written a list of each months payments until a few months ago.

I would set up reminders here and there, but they would mostly end up going ignored. I somehow relied on my memory to get me through, which is quite scary when you consider that my friends call me “Dory”.

I’m honestly not sure how I was able to make most of my payments on time back then. I actually ended up making double payments on quite a few bills because I would forget that I had paid them and in a haste on their due date I would make another payment.

I would then be a month ahead on payments and get out of the habit of paying that one by the following month. It was a complete mess.

I’m sure that some of you are functioning the same way, under a form of organized chaos. Maybe you enjoy it, maybe you are finding it hard to keep up.

I wanted to give you a run through of exactly how I currently keep track of my monthly payments and debts in case you are one of those people who are looking for a way out of the mess.

How I Keep Track of My Bills & Payments

Completely opposite to how I “organized” my bills before, I am now a bit “anal” with how I pay my bills each month. I do everything manually and actually prefer it.

I use Evernote to keep track of my bills and their due dates. I do this to make sure I don’t forget any of them, as well as to allow me to visually see how they are broken up that month.

Evernote is run on a cloud-based system, so every change I make is saved regardless of what kind of device I am using. This is great for people like me who can’t even remember to put gas in the car until it beeps at me.

I keep my full list of my bills for the entire month in a note titled “Bills”. How predictable. Here is an example of what that list would look like:

7 – Cable bill- $65
7 – Credit Card bill – $50
9 – Gas bill – $45
9 – Netflix – $7.99
11 – Cell Phone – $75
15 – Rent – $500
18 – Student Loan #1 – $267
19 – Car – $192
24 – Water Bill – $55
Each pay – Gas, etc. – $50
Each pay – Yearly Bills – $65
Each pay – Car Insurance – $53

This list resembles my personal list of bills, but is more of a generic example.

Bills Organized by Pay Schedule

I separate the full list out into bi-weekly periods that coincide with my pay schedule. I pay myself twice a month through a system I learned from the book “Profit First” which I highly recommend for any business owner!

I add up the ones that need to be paid during that time frame and calculate how much of my paycheck I will have left over (which goes in parenthesis). That extra amount will go towards the debt I am currently focusing on.

I put the dates I need to account for at the end of a long line to break up with pay weeks. I then have the total of those bills listed, as well as the amount of my paycheck left over in parenthesis. Here is a visual of what I’m talking about:

—————————9/26 to 10/9 – $410.99 ($589.01)
7 – Cable – $65
7 – Credit Card – $50
9 – Gas bill – $45
9 – Netflix – $7.99
11 – Cell Phone – $75
Each pay – Gas, etc. – $50
Each pay – Yearly Bills – $65
Each pay – Car Insurance – $53

I make sure to include money I will need for gas to get to and from work so that I don’t end up without that in my budget.

So that first example looks great, right? I would have $589.01 to put towards my student loan. Well, it seems that way, but I always look ahead to make sure I will have enough to cover the bills for the following bi-weekly period:

—————-10/10 to 10/24 – $1182 (-$182)
15 – Rent – $500
18 – Student Loan #1 – $267
19 – Car – $192
24 – Water Bill – $55
Each pay – Gas, etc. – $50
Each pay – Yearly Bills – $65
Each pay – Car Insurance – $53

I would be glad I did take a peek ahead in this example. It looks like that $182 of that money I had left over during the previous time frame is going to be needed for the next pay period. This means I still have $407 extra to put towards my loans. Not bad at all.

I would then either just let that extra money sit in the checking account until the next paycheck came through, or pay off one (or more) of the bills that would be due during that next time frame during this period. It really depends on which bill is coming up. If it is a student loan payment, or credit card payments I will go ahead and pay it so I can save some money in interest.

The Strategy Behind Tracking Bills This Way

You may have noticed that I keep all of the bills in bold font. Each time I pay one of my bills, I change that line from bold to regular font. This leaves the unpaid bills looking more noticeable so that I don’t end up forgetting any.

I make most of my payments through Capital One 360’s bill pay system. To stay on top of this, once I schedule a payment I will write “scheduled” next to that amount so I know that it will come out as soon as I get paid.

I typically stay on top of my bills pretty regularly, about every other day or so, just to make sure I’m not forgetting anything (again, they call me Dory for a reason).

There are things that I save up for in each paycheck, such as yearly bills, taxes, car insurance, and even upcoming weddings.

This is something I just recently started doing so that I wouldn’t be caught off guard every six months or so when those bills crept up.

I used to end up putting these on a credit card and slowly paying them off. I think this new method is absolutely crucial to make sure you don’t end up back in debt by putting a big expense on a credit card.

Why Not Pay Everything Automatically?

Some people may look at my method and think I’m absolutely nuts. Why not just use automatic payments and have everything taken out on a more regular schedule? There is a reason behind this madness, I promise.

Since I am really hustling to get my debt paid off, I need every extra penny to go towards my student loans. As soon as I have the extra money, I want to make a payment to my loan company. This ends up with me paying less interest AND not procrastinating on making the payments every month, which was how I used to get myself in trouble.

I would tell myself that I was going to put the extra towards my payments once the next paycheck came, but then I never would. Something more important would always pop into the picture and the loan payment became secondary.

By immediately throwing my money at the student loan companies (that would actually be fun, wouldn’t it?!) I keep myself accountable for putting the extra money towards my debt.

I know my faults and have learned to plan around them so they don’t get in the way of my goals. I find that this is the best way to keep track of my bills.

How do you keep track of your bills?

8 thoughts on “The Best Way to Keep Track of Your Bills”

  1. I like your idea of “throwing money at student loan companies”. I’ve been fortunate enough to not need a loan, but I sure did feel like converting my $9,449 tuition payment into quarters and literally throwing it at my school’s Bursar’s Office for payment. I caught myself and decided to write a check instead 🙂

    I can certainly learn from this. I actually paid my electric bill twice this month. One was from the automatic payment that I set up originally, and the other was me receiving a bill from the electric company and scheduling a payment through my bank. I swear it’s their fault lol.

    Reply
    • I’m glad I’m not the only one who has thought about “throwing” money at lenders/the bursar’s office. 🙂

      I used to be the queen of duplicate payments, so I definitely understand how that happens! Keeping a simple list like this definitely does help, but you have to remember to go in and check it once in a while and make sure it’s updated. I hope this method helps!

      Reply
  2. I love this! I have been struggling with the idea of whether or not to remove my automatic payments from my loans. The only reason I am on the fence is because since I have changed to automatic, I’ve bumped up my payments (as opposed to my minimum so that I mentally plan for the larger deduction as if I have no choice) and my loan companies offered me .25% deduction since it is set up as automatic. I still wonder if I would contribute more if I was set up as automatic. I guess it depends on the person and their spending that month. It’s definitely helpful to hear other people’s experiences!

    Reply
    • Thanks, Shannon! With student loans I would keep the automatic payment they have set up for you. That .25% deduction is absolutely worth it. I have those set up and just make extra payments on top of them. Whatever that extra amount in the parentheses is, generally goes directly to the student loan company.

      It also keeps me motivated because I get to see just how much money I will have left over each paycheck once my debt is paid off. 🙂

      Reply
  3. I have everything that I can on autopay. I also use a basic spreadsheet to track all of my funds going in and out of my checking account. If I don’t make a payment immediately, but put the amount on my spreadsheet so I know it’s coming out, I highlight it in red, to remind myself that I have to schedule it.

    Reply

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