Paperless: A growing number of companies these days totally embrace paperless transactions and billing.
But there are still some who persist in sending out bills and the like to our households, despite championing this completely logical solution. Unlike physically delivered bills which can get lost due to human error, paperless cannot.
If like me, you now conduct all your business dealings via the internet, you are participating in a brilliant concept. It is fast (practically instantaneous) and it saves millions by not using paper, postage, and countless man-hours.
I deal with two particular utility companies regarding my water supply. One totally embraces the concept of paperless billing, while the other still insists on sending an acknowledgment of payment via snail mail, despite the fact that they have already acknowledged my online payment by sending me a receipt notice via email. Even my energy supplier can’t quite get the idea of being fully paperless. While they do send me emails about their latest offers, they still persist in sending them for a second time via the mail-man – Why? It makes no sense.
Paying lip service to a logical concept like paperless billing while continuing to use paper is not only counter-productive but criminal in this day and age – email acknowledgment costs nothing!
What part of paperless billing don’t they fully get I wonder?
Even my bank has not yet fully grasped the concept. Every once in a while they will send me a physical copy of a bank statement.
Why for god’s sake when I have access to all of them online?
Many companies that rely on catalogue sales operate online these days. You go to their site and select what you want, pay for it electronically and wait for it to be delivered to your door. All fine and dandy you would think – right?
Wrong!
When that package arrives, what else could be in it I wonder? If you ordered the darned thing online, why would you possibly want a big heavy paper catalogue? Our supermarkets still insist on sending out their catalogues too, despite knowing that we ordered online!
It is high time to end sending out paper to those of us who have moved with the times and conduct our business online. I can just hear the various legal sections within business bleating pathetically – “But we’re required to by law”.
Absolute bulldust!
Come on people within the business world, it time to grasp the nettle and step completely into the 21st century.
