sir_eccles

Hehe, yes we did have a float at one point.

Hehe, yes it did. Child birth. The actual birth was well covered by insurance. A severe case of PPD afterwards took a while to get over with a lot of unexpected additional costs and lowered income.

Hehe, yes we are. Though slowly we are getting the ship righted. Paying down the credit cards which got misused has been a priority. The wife's new job is helping.

petitefrancaise

ok, I'm on a low-caffeine day so bear with me...
so you pay your bills with the credit card and stick/keep the money which would have been used to pay the bills in an interest bearing account? Is that what you mean?

Michael

No, I just mean that it takes a bit of effort and time jiggling around the payment date for very little money saved with today's low interest rates.

On the other hand, this quarter discover card gives 5% cashback at gas stations and can be used to get 5% or more cashback when used through the discover card portal, Target red card has a 5% discount, Lowe's card has a 5% discount, Amazon card has a 3% cashback on Amazon and 2% at restaurants and pharmacies, etc.. Therefore if I remember to use the correct credit card at the correct place, I should be able to easily save a significant amount of money and even though all my bills are paid by automatic debit, I would save very little money by delaying those payments by a few days using bill pay.

Also some people won't/can't use credit cards since they can't control their spending habits and look at credit cards as extra money which gets them into debt. By not using credit cards and not able to control their spending habits, they are paying 1%-5% more on most things they purchase than those that use credit cards.

The savings on a 1% APY bank account delaying bill payments by 15 days per month is effectively a 0.5% APY saving but a 1% cashback on a credit card purchase is effectively a 12% APY and a 5% cashback is 60% APY.

Gillymonkey

It's never been an issue for us, in fact I sort of like it. We both get paid biweekly on the same day.

Pay 1 - Gas/elec, car 1 payment, internet etc, big massive grocery shop, send money home to UK for student loans, daycare

Pay 2 - rent, car 2 payment, daycare

It works for us and we are now in a routine where we know exactly what needs paid off each wage.

Bob

Lot easier said than done, if one doesn't have any frivolous spending to begin with

LondonSquirrel

Speaking as a payroll officer rather than an employee, I have to say I am glad I work in the UK on a monthly payment system. It must be a lot more work for the payroll staff in the US having to run 26 payrolls per year rather than just 12.

I have worked at the same place for 20 years getting paid on the 24th of the month. In my previous job we got paid on the last Wednesday of the month which was horrible having some 4 weeks in between salaries and some 5 weeks. Getting a salary on the same day of every month is much easier.

sir_eccles

Sometimes there are 27 pay periods.

scrubbedexpat091

Not always possible to build a float. I'd prefer to have some savings, but since everything keeps rising in costs and only so much can be cut back, and pay isn't going up, doesn't leave much if any left at the end of the month.

I just got paid today, 926 since there was holiday pay on it. Rent is 850, leaving 76 dollars. Got gas for the car 40, leaving 36 for food for the week.

Next week my GF gets paid, but her check goes to the car payment, car insurance, and renters insurance, leaving about 120 for food, and gas.

There is simply nothing left to save no matter how hard someone may want to.

My GF also got hours cut, so our income is 300 less now each month which doesn't help.

Food is basically the only thing we can cut back on, so that is what we do.

You can't cut back on much when there is very little luxury purchases made.

Pulaski

One year, perhaps because of an extra pay cycle, my employer deducted all the health and benefits charges over one few payroll than the actual number of payrolls, so right after Christmas I got a bumper pay cheque with only taxes and SS deducted.

Another benefit to weekly or two-weekly pay cycles, compared to half-monthly or monthly is what happens in leap years. Will you be paid for working February 29, 2016?

scrubbedexpat091

All the places I have worked outsourced payroll so they likely don't care. I haven't worked at a company with in house payroll in nearly a decade now, suppose large companies still find it useful to do in house.

orly

Had jobs that are weekly, bi-weekly or monthly in the past. Never really mattered too much which method as I was usually pretty decent at having money sitting to cover everything.

If I had the choice I'd probably choose monthly.

Vimto

I wonder why the US is the only country (that I have worked in at least) which has a 2 week or bi-monthly pay period for salaried staff? All other countries either have a weekly or monthly wage payment regimes
anyone know why?

markonline1

It's America. They have to do everything different.

Pulaski

USA North (Canada) does too.

scrubbedexpat091

Canada is bi-weekly or 2 times per month in the provinces I have worked in anyhow.

In BC where I am labor standards does not permit monthly pay. Can be no less then 2 times per month.

Most places do bi-weekly or 2 times a month. I haven't worked anywhere that paid weekly yet.