All 4 of my home utility bills prevent paying more than the balance: water, electricity, gas and internet.

The reason for this is probably to prevent ML. I do work for a bank that shall not be named and we do monitor credit balance refunds ~very~ closely and all CBR requests are manually processed. It is a huge red flag in my professional experience for ML especially when it is frequent and for large dollar amounts.

Edit: It is probably even worse for utility companies esp if they accept credit cards for payment, criminals can take stolen credit cards and convert them to checks.

The difference is utilities have to be tied to an address/service. So you can't just open up random water bills for the purposes of overpayment.

But I take the overall point. If you do it, I would imagine you can only do it once in a great while.

That makes sense. Keep in mind that mail theft is also rampant in some areas as well. I see it all the time. I've put stop payment orders on CBR checks because someone's mail was stolen several times.

Bumping this thread. I just got a $500 refund check from AMwater.
I have another $1000 check supposedly in the mail. Once I receive that check I will attempt to make a few more payments and then request refund again. Concurrent with what was stated by OP, I can pay $1000 at a time for a $1.95 fee.

Does anyone else have experience with this? I would like to try to figure out velocity limits and hit this as hard as possible before they shut my account.

I recently moved to an apartment complex, and my water is now billed thru RentManager. I stopped service at my old address, but I can still log in and make payments. The 2nd check I'm expecting is from a payment made after I had already submitted the stop service request with my account at a negative balance.

Any related DP's greatly appreciated.

Datapoint:

Con Edison of NY, Con Ed, electric company of many years. Have paid by “AutoPay” ACH debit from my checking account based on paper form submitted to Con Ed for so many years I haven’t had to update AutoPay details online.

I’ve recently been reminded by these forums, THANK YOU FT, how easy it is to make additional payments prior to AutoPay date which will decrease or eliminate AutoPay amount and that one can make multiple payments for the same bill.

I recently enrolled all my credit cards in AutoPay as a back-up in case I forget a payment, which I always do within a few days of statement date and in full. And although my mobile phone bill has been on AutoPay from a bank (for T-Mobile $5 discount), I’ve just stated paying $10 per month with a Biz Plat (for $10 AmEx discount) and then most of the balance by Ink Cash (for 5x Mobile phone category) leaving just a few dollars for AutoPay from checking account (for T-Mobile $5 discount). Another “Triple Dip”, in addition to Biz Plat 3 Airline Fee credits for 1 AF, I like it .

First Con Ed credit card payment was just a few days ago, no fee for “personal accounts”. As a test I did a “typo” of exactly $100 more than balance. Balance showed $100 credit the next day, called, was told it could go toward next month’s bill or I could receive a check but a check would take “a while”, agent could not specify how long “a while” is, I asked for a check. Today, just 2 days later, I see a $100 pending deposit to my checking account.

I like it when “a while” for a bank or credit card company refund is 2 days. Think $21,000 is a bit much of a “typo” for next month ;)?

https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...0fcb6f8ba2.jpg

i accidentally did this with my water bill where I cancelled ACH and used a card. It took a month and a half for $400 to come in mail as check, no option to direct deposit. Not worth it to me IMO

You were lucky to get a check.
Many utilities will just credit your account and send a monthly bill of $0 until the credit is used up.

As some military fighter pilots like to say (sarcastically because most of them think that they personally are the best pilot) “I’d rather be lucky than (be) good”.

Most MS juice isn’t worth the squeeze, this is almost effortless and cost free, other than miniscule opportunity cost. I’m planning to wash rinse and repeat this MS with increasing amounts, I’ll try to post again with next month’s experience.

IMO, using many cards to max out the bonus's is fine, but overpaying is going to lead to trouble in the long run. In my mind doing it at a couple of hundred per month is not really worth it unless you are really desperate. There are easier ways to MS. Going all in and doing it at scale is way too risky. But YMMV

maybe I am too conservative, but the electric company firing me as a customer for the sake of a couple of hundred points would be a problem especially when I can MS points so cheaply (albeit with a different risk profile)

Thanks for the warnings. Hard to imagine Con Ed, which has a monopoly for electric service in my area, “firing me as a customer” for any reason other than long term non-payment.

Although it’s off topic for this thread, please briefly point out the “easier” and “cheaper” (than zero) ways to MS.

FWIW, I’ve been warned several times that AmEx RAT will come for me for at least 4-5 years and I’ve yet to hear from them. No guts, no glory.

Utilities don't fire customers, rather they just restrict what you can do with them, such as overpay a bill. As a one time event, it is not an issue, but repeated regularly will produce issues.

As far as Amex is concerned, two small points. First, things work well until they don't, and with Amex, there is no warning when the train goes off the track.
Second, if you are a good customer with Amex, they bend over backwards to take care of you. If you are charging 6 digits a year with them, they are very accommodating.especially when using cards with fees in the hundreds.
And finally, Amex seems to prefer clawbacks rather then outright shuttering of accounts, unless the behavior is egregious ;)

If you are relocating and dont care about the service anymore, one can try thousands of dollars of MS with utilitties. People have pushed the MS to millions of dollars with wells Fargo etc, so this is not out of the realm of the possibility. Back in those days, it was profitable to quit the job and park yourself in MS friendly area with bunch of Target, walmart, CVS, Walgreens & go to work.

It is all about who can do it at a scale and speed. You can look at some people's spread sheet to see what they track and intensity with which they do things.