Mark Dubois used to spend a half-hour or more every two weeks paying bills. He's trimmed that by more than two-thirds by clicking a mouse instead of a pen.
Bill-paying online has been around for a while, but relative newcomer electronic bill presentment allows banks, credit unions, brokerages and computer portals to set up systems so their customers — like Dubois — can both receive their bills and pay them online.
Dubois, who also happens to be marketing director for Utah First Credit Union, which offers the service, is among a growing number of people putting their money where their mouse is.
"It takes me between five and 10 minutes to pay my bills," he said. "Without it, I'd have to write the check, put it in the envelope, get a stamp, drive to the post office and mail it."
He's not the only paper/timesaver. James Van Dyke, a senior analyst with Jupiter Media Metrix of San Francisco, said about 700,000 households nationwide used electronic bill presentment, or EBP, at the end of last year. That figure is expected to grow to 2.8 million by the end of this year and mushroom to 40.2 million by 2005.
"I think the Internet momentum is so strong, and I think this is now at a stage where people will say they'll give it a try," Dubois said. "Two years ago, people were very hesitant due to security issues and everything that goes along with privacy. But they're in a comfort zone now, using the Internet in a day-to-day way to deal with life."
Companies with electronic bill presentment typically have a list of billers to whom payments may be sent. Once customers set up their accounts, they can receive and view bills, pay bills from checking or money market accounts, contact customer service reps, dispute bills, take advantage of targeted marketing offers and check payment histories.
The system even allows a person to schedule the payment of a bill in advance, pay a set amount for a bill the same day each month or pay bills while traveling.
All with a few clicks of a mouse. No paper bills. No stamps. No envelopes. Billers eventually stop sending paper bills to people who use the electronic setup.
"Writing checks is something people are accustomed to, and money has been moving in and out of checking accounts electronically for years," said Judy Wicks, vice president of media strategy for CheckFree, a Georgia-based company specializing in EBP technology.
"But once a person is enrolled, the first time it will take about the same amount of time to pay bills online as it did the traditional way. But after that first month, they'll be doing it in seconds or minutes."
CheckFree has a demonstration of the technology on its Web site, www.checkfree.com.
Many banks, credit unions, brokerages and portals such as Yahoo! have the service available, as does personal financial management software such as Quicken.
Depending on who provides the service, it can be free. At Yahoo!, it's free for the first three months and then $7 for 40 payments, or $2 plus 40 cents for each bill. Many banks charge about $4.50 per month for unlimited bill payment, or about $5 for 10 bills and a small fee for anything over that.
US Bank and Firstar, two merging banks, have about 800,000 total online banking customers, with about 40,000 using online bill payment.
"That's still a relatively small number of our customers, but it's a service we're seeing grow rapidly," said Linda Garner, vice president of online banking for US Bank, which started offering online bill paying in August. "The average customer is paying between eight and 10 bills on the system every month through the online bill payment system.
"Some customers aren't ready to make that leap, but there tends to be an evolution in which people start using Internet banking first to check account information and then expand into other Internet services. Originally, people had concerns about security, but as time goes on, people are realizing Internet transactions are secure. That concern is fading over time, which is why we're seeing very rapid adoption."
The system benefits all types of bill-payers, from "stackers" to "schedulers," she said.
"We have customers who travel a lot, and this makes it easy to go in and schedule a payment while they're on the road. They can take their computer with them and schedule their bills while traveling. All this makes it so you'll go from two, three or four bills per month to more because it's so much more convenient."
That should be welcome news to the typical American household, which spends two hours per month paying an average of 12 to 18 bills, according to Jupiter.
Convenience is what Dubois discovered more than two years ago. He pays nine bills each month via the computer. He sends payment along to take care of his mortgage, utilities, telecommunications, gasoline and Sandy city expenses, taking advantage of a setup that allows CheckFree to send checks to any entity that is not on its regular biller list but does have electronic transaction capability.
"I love it," he said. "I haven't made a payment through a check in a long time. I hate writing checks, and I have a lack of time. I'm 37 years old, so technology for me is a fun way to go. I think the selling point is convenience. It's just less hassle."
CheckFree adds other components to make it attractive, such as protections against late fees or interest charges and fraud if bills are paid as they should.
The advantages for banks or others offering the service are numerous.
"It builds loyalty, because consumers believe you are offering the best plan already, so why switch?" Wicks said. Online billpayers typically are "dream consumers," with higher-than-average education and income, she added.
Utah First has about 300 of its 15,500 members using the system but is adding three or four each day, Dubois said.
"We think this will really take off," said Roger Dickson, marketing director for Goldenwest Credit Union, which has about 1,000 of its 41,000 customers using electronic bill payment.
"We just had a huge jump in bill paying online last year and doubled the amount of users the past four or five months. The presentment side will be really huge. We're planning to have that be part of our marketing campaign."
That marketing is what will fuel the industry's growth, Van Dyke said. Billers have made significant investments in the technology and will be trying to recover that investment by making customers aware of what they have to offer.
"For billers, it can shut off the paper printing press," he said, noting that consumer billing costs U.S. companies about $18 billion per year. "And about 80 percent of that will be wiped out once all consumer bills are presented online and the printing presses are shut off."
Wicks said the technology is attractive to three basic groups of consumers: "mouse potatoes," who like to have their families using the latest software for their home PCs; "fast-forwards," who are constantly looking to streamline their lives; and "New Age nurturers," who use the speed of technology to afford them more time with their families and social lives instead of tackling mundane tasks.
"Once you've paid bills online, you'll never go back," she said. "Writing the same checks to the same people at the same address, month after month? We can do it a better way."
"It's a huge savings of time," Garner said. "You just go click, click, click and you're done."
E-mail: bwallace@desnews.com