These days, any paycheck is a good paycheck. So why am I complaining?!

About five years ago, my company switched from paying me monthly to bi-weekly.   Troubleeeee!   I was running especially close to the wire then, and this change reeked havoc with me getting my monthly bills paid on time.

If you’re also experiencing this problem, here’s some possible ways to deal.

The simple answer is to keep enough money in your checking account so that you don’t need to worry about becoming overdrawn. But my ING checking account earns 0.5% interest, and my ING savings account earns 1 .85% interest.   As meager as both these numbers are, I want to earn as much interest as possible.

The next is to stagger your bill payment dates so that they line up with each of the paychecks. This doesn’t work for long, though, because the paycheck date within each month changes.   Pretty soon it’s all messed up again.

I finally came up with a combo-solution.   It requires monitoring my accounts about two days before each pay day, and tweaking   automatic bill pays and account transfers.

Here’s what I do:

1)   My paycheck direct deposits into our ING checking account.   This account is used to pay all expenses except those we need a paper check for.

2)   My spouses’ check (which arrives the same day as mine) direct deposits into our Bank of America (BAC) checking account – so that we have a way to write paper checks easily.     You can write paper checks with ING, but you can’t give it to the recipient immediately- it has to be mailed.   We also use the BAC account to get cash for daily spending.   BAC checking gives 0% interest, but the money is easily accessible, so is a neccessary evil.

3)   I calculate how much money we need for checks/cash in the BAC account (plus maintaining the minimum balance of $500 to avoid fees) and transfer the remainder over to our ING savings account.

4)   I then have automatic deposits into the ING checking account from the ING savings account on a bi-weekly basis.   These deposits are immediate.   Deposits from BAC to ING have a seven day waiting period before the money is accessible.

Sound confusing?   With automatic everything, including most bill payments, it simply requires me going in to adjust the values twice a month as needed.

Twice a year you will get the added bonus of three paydays in one month! This is how we save! That money usually goes directly into our savings account.   Others might use it to pay down debts.   We always take a part of it for something fun, though, too. 😉