Who writes the checks?

MC22

I just paid a couple of our bills and wonder how you guys manage yours.  Do you sit down together and go through bills each month?  Is one of you responsible for paying all of them?  Do you each have certain bills that you pay?

I don't mean whose account does it come out of if you haven't established / don't plan to have joint accounts. 

Just curious who is actually responsible for the act of writing the checks...

Boynton1286

I am responsible. We used to do it separately before we got married but still lived together, he paid everything of his and I paid everything of mine. Once we got married and he moved into my checking account, I took it over. I am a bit of a freak about the checking account and I wouldn't have been able to give up the control. He was more than willing to let me take it over!

I actually just had to tell him that we are pretty much broke until next paycheck because we have a lot of stuff due that we normally don't have (car lincensing, vet bills, etc). He questioned me about it and I got a little p!ssy, but he wasn't meaning to question my spending. I need to learn to explain with out being a snot

 

hz80408

I do.

We have a joint account for our cost of living expenses.  I used that and bill pay online for all of our utilities, cable, rent, etc.

ead1975

I write the rent check, but we split the other utilities and pay them online.  He pays the cable, and I pay the electric and gas. He deducts my share of the cable bill from his half of the rest of them, and he transfers the money over to my account. (We have separate checking accounts.)

MC22

We split them...I pay a few, and he pays the rest (the big ones).  We have a spreadsheet where we enter the amount spent each month and the date paid on each bill.

Patineuse1124

I have most of our bills paid on my credit card automatically when there isn't an additional charge to do so, it's easy, I get all the points, and I pay it off each month, and I'd have to pay my credit card bill anyways (which I pay online).  When there are checks to be written that is my job.

Tisharp

We have lived together for so long that we just kept everything the same as it always has been.  I still say that I am paying him "rent" when I hand over some money on payday.  lol  It's redic!

But, I pay my "rent" and he pays the bills, so it still works out.

hz80408

Patineuse1124:

I have most of our bills paid on my credit card automatically when there isn't an additional charge to do so, it's easy, I get all the points, and I pay it off each month, and I'd have to pay my credit card bill anyways (which I pay online).  When there are checks to be written that is my job.

Nice, I wish we could pay via CC for the points!

christieep

We have separate accounts and a joint account.  I pretty much keep tabs on the joint account and make sure that the bills get paid.

nfp147

We have separate accounts, so I tell him what half the bills are and he sends me that and half the mortgage every month. I don't think I could give up control, and I don't think he cares.

joljus

I pay the bills and make sure the account is in order and budget every month... he contributes his pay check and does the laundry

DH is HORRIBLE with money.... we combined our accounts shortly after moving in together because he kept forgetting to pay bills and it was too much of a hassle for him to transfer the funds over.

Because of his spending habits he is on a strict cash only "diet" since NYE... his resolution this year was to learn better spending habits lol! He gets $20.00 a week for whatever little things he wants like coffee or snacks, whatever is left he puts in our vacation fund... I have to say, I think he is getting better... it's Friday and he told me he still has $15.00!

 

rccola1981

he pays our bills, but I write more checks...I love this little thrift shop by us and it only takes checks.  He pays everything Friday morning and tells me what we have left, and I generally check with him before spending anything more than $5

Bre2Be

I was more than happy to give over control of this aspect.  I am a spender and not great about paying bills on time.  We just recently got a joint account and C handles most of the finances.  We both have our paychecks deposited to our joint account and then transfer over an "allowance" to our personal accounts that we can spend on whatever.  (ie clothes/shoes for me and books/games for him)

There's really only 2 actual checks we write; one for rent, which he writes and the other for tithes every 2 weeks, which can be either of us. 

chantico23

All of our accounts are joint.  I budget our finances in a spreadsheet and then we sit down together twice a month (usually only takes about 10 minutes, and we do it a few days before pay day) to review our expenses for the upcoming two weeks and make adjustments.  A lot of our bills are auto-drafted, but those that aren't I pay using online bill pay.  I am also the one who balances our cash flow/account summaries (in addition to balancing our  checking account we also have our balances broken down according to what we plan to spend each dollar on), but even though I do the work, Matt looks at our accounts several times a week.  Yes, we are incredibly planned with our finances, but it helps us to stay on track for our goals.

crystaldes1029

We kept it simple... we have a joint account (only for cashing joint checks) but still maintain our own accounts.

He pays mortgage and I pay all the other utilities & extra bills. It evens out enough. Then we each pay our own credit card, student loan and other personal bills. 

Xan921

We have a joint account but each have our own accounts as well.  I am the one who keeps track of the bills and am usually the one to go online and actually make the transaction, but it varies whos account it comes from.  The cable is due on the 6th so the other day I mentioned it, he handed me his card, and I paid it.  It really just depends on who has more money in their account at the time.  We've gotten really good at viewing the money as 'our' money rather than mine or his, so to us it doesn't matter which account it comes out of, it's all the same to us.  But I'm the one who actually makes sure things get paid.

Mia2700

Mike.

He's in finance so he calculates the most efficient way to pay the bills to attack the most principal and whatever so I let him do his thing lol