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[Plastiq] Pay any bill with credit card for 0%-2.85% fee

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[Plastiq] Pay any bill with credit card for 0%-2.85% fee

I'm sure a lot of people already know about this, but it comes up often enough on different threads I thought it deserved its own home (and I couldn't find a thread covering it).

Plastiq.com lets you pay practically ANY bill with your credit card. The fees are effectively 2.5%.

Normally you wouldn't want to pay a bill with your credit card just to pay a fee for that privilege, but if your card pays you back more than the fee, it's worth it. For example, I value the SPG Amex earn rate at 3-4%, so even 2.5% is a positive benefit for me (*if* I need points and want to "buy" them at 2.5c per point or less I can do that by using Plastiq on some bills I wouldn't normally otherwise be able to pay with a CC, like Hydro & Gas).
Another use case is if you have a credit card signup bonus with a large minimum spend you have to hit -- it can be worth it to pay a small fee to unlock a bonus worth $300 or $500 or whatever the case may be.

So anyways, perhaps we can aggregate a reference list here of the various fees for each payee so people who haven't signed up yet can better see how it may be beneficial for them to use.

Outdated fee table:

EDIT: Thanks to the "new and improved RFD" this table is horribly broken :( ... hopefully it fixes itself or the add a new way to do tables again soon?

Hand-edited table (thanks @atomiton) that looks okay on desktop but still horrible on mobile:

Code: Select all

+--------------------------------+----------------------+------------+-------+-------+
|             Payee              | Sent electronically? | MasterCard | Visa  | AMEX  |
+--------------------------------+----------------------+------------+-------+-------+
| Default (e.g. mailed cheque)   | NO                   | 2.25%      | 2.50% | 2.50% |
| BC Hydro                       | YES                  | 1.50%      | 1.75% | 2.50% |
| FortisBC                       | YES                  | 2.25%      | 2.50% | 2.50% |
| Metro Vancouver Property Taxes | YES                  | 2.25%      | 2.50% | 2.50% |
| Hydro Quebec                   | YES                  | 1.50%      | ?     | ?     |
| CRA (taxes)                    | YES                  | 1.74%      | 1.99% | 2.50% |
| OSAP                           | YES                  | 1.74%      | ?     | ?     |
+--------------------------------+----------------------+------------+-------+-------+

My attempt at a smaller table for mobile ...

+-----------------+------+-------+-------+-------+
|                 | Sent | Master|       |       |
| Payee           | Elec | Card  | Visa  | AMEX  |
+-----------------+------+-------+-------+-------+
| Default (e.g.   |      |       |       |       |
|  mailed cheque) | NO   | 2.25% | 2.50% | 2.50% |
| BC Hydro        | YES  | 1.50% | 1.75% | 2.50% |
| FortisBC        | YES  | 2.25% | 2.50% | 2.50% |
| Metro Vancouver |      |       |       |       |
|  Property Taxes | YES  | 2.25% | 2.50% | 2.50% |
| Hydro Quebec    | YES  | 1.50% | ?     | ?     |
| CRA (taxes)     | YES  | 1.74% | 1.99% | 2.50% |
| OSAP            | YES  | 1.74% | ?     | ?     |
+-----------------+------+-------+-------+-------+

For reference ...
Landscape mobile view wraps about ........................... here:
+--------------------------------+----------------------+---------+
Portrait mobile wraps about ... here:
+-----------------+------+-------+--+
I think these are out of date now and need to be updated, most things are 2.25-2.5% across the board I believe unless there is a promo applicable like 2% for Amex.


You CAN also get 0% fees if you have earned "fee-free dollars" (FFDs). How those work is, e.g. if you have $200 FFDs you can pay a $200 bill and avoid the fees on that $200 (max $5 savings at 2.5% fee).

If you have a friend with Plastiq, ask them to refer you***. This is what I did:

Recommended steps to get $800 fee-free dollars of payments (save $20 in fees):
1) I got referred and got $200 FFDs. You need to pay a minimum $20 bill to unlock the FFDs so I chose the lowest fee 1.5% MC BC Hydro on my 2% back Cap1 card. You may need to wait a day to see the FFDs get posted.
2) Then I referred my spouse and she got $200 more in addition to $400 for myself for referring her (repeat $20 bill pay to unlock FFDs on 2nd account)
So $800 combined. That saved us up to $20 in fees on future bill payments (Fortis BC and Property Taxes partially paid to use up these FFDs)

***
DISCLAIMER / PRIVACY WARNING
DO NOT ASK FOR REFERRALS ON THE RFD FORUMS - it's against the rules.
(Besides, it's only $5 in fees max you save for a $200 FFD referral)
Also NOTE: If you value your anonymity, your referer gets an email saying you signed up and that includes your full name. So let's just not spam this thread with referral requests but just try to add some data points on how it works, what the fees are, and answer any common questions.
***


.


Original table broken still below for reference ...
[table="width: 600"]

[tr]

[td]Payee[/td]

[td]Sent electronically?[/td]

[td]MasterCard[/td]

[td]Visa[/td]

[td]American Express[/td]



[/tr]

[tr]

[td]Default not pre-existing payee
(e.g. mailed cheque)[/td]

[td]NO[/td]

[td]2.25%[/td]

[td]2.25% 2.50%[/td]

[td]2.50%
(src: [OP])[/td]

[/tr]

[tr]

[td]BC Hydro[/td]

[td]YES[/td]

[td]1.50%[/td]

[td]1.75%[/td]

[td]2.25% 2.50%
(src: [OP])[/td]

[/tr]

[tr]

[td]FortisBC[/td]

[td]YES[/td]

[td]2.25%[/td]

[td]2.25% 2.50%[/td]

[td]2.50%
(src: [OP])[/td]

[/tr]

[tr]

[td]Metro Vancouver area Property Taxes[/td]

[td]YES[/td]

[td]2.25%[/td]

[td]2.50%[/td]

[td]2.50%
(src: [OP])[/td]

[/tr]

[tr]

[td]Hydro Quebec[/td]

[td]YES[/td]

[td]1.50%
(src: Flitox)[/td]

[td]?[/td]

[td]?[/td]

[/tr]


[tr]

[td]CRA (taxes)[/td]

[td]YES[/td]

[td]1.74%[/td]

[td]1.99%[/td]

[td]2.50%
(src: blitzkrieg)[/td]

[/tr]

[tr]

[td]OSAP[/td]

[td]YES[/td]

[td]1.74%
(src:Troydabes)[/td]
[td]?[/td]
[td]?[/td]
[/tr]

[/table]
Last edited by ace604 on Jul 10th, 2016 6:57 pm, edited 4 times in total.
POLL: How frequent is your RRSP-matching?
Plastiq: Pay any bill with credit card for 0-2.5% fee (help meet min spending and keep old cards active!)
Rewards program transfer times (e.g. SPG->Aeroplan, Marriott->SPG, Amex MR->SPG...)
1598 replies
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Reserved for future use?

Here are some other Plastiq threads (not sure why these don't show up in thread search - does RFD forum search actually suck that bad?). Mostly expired deals, but some useful info can be found: FAQs:

Can I pay Canadian bills with a US credit card?
Yes.

How do I see the fee for a certain bill payee?
- Add the credit card type (MasterCard, Visa, Amex) that you want to see the fee for.
- Add the payee to your list.
- Setup a payment up to the point where you would confirm (but no need to confirm actual payment).
The $ and % fee will be shown on this page. If you have FFDs the fee will be $0 (or partly $0) and the % fee will not be correct (either entirely covered by FFDs and 0% fee, or partly covered and an incorrect percent, but you can calculate the actual percent in that case by dividing the $ fee by the part of the bill over and above your FFDs)

I just did above and I get a different (higher) fee than that in the table in OP, why?
Double-check if you chose a pre-existing payee from the list that is setup for "electronic" payments already (this shows in the left sidebar if payment sent electronically or by mailed cheque).
Mailed cheques will always be the max fee (I think 2.25% for MC/Visa and 2.50% for Amex). If you choose a pre-existing payee that's already been setup with Plastiq (and they have made a deal with Plastiq for a certain fee, then you would see a lower than "standard" fee for that payee, but NOT if you manually add your own version of that payee). If the address doesn't exactly match the payment address, don't worry - no cheque is going to be mailed if it is setup for electronic payment.

I already signed up without a referral, is there any way to get the $200 FFD signup bonus still?
Yes, in fact I did exactly this myself :)
1) remove all credit cards from account
2) remove all payees
3) change email address on account to some secondary email of yours
4) change name on account
5) delete account (if there is a way to do that?)
6) start over again with a referral link, you should get $200 FFDs after you make a $20 bill payment (see recommendations in OP - pick your cheapest payee like 1.5% for Hydro)

Do the FFDs actually expiry after 90 days and is there a way to refresh their expiry date?
Yes, and yes. As long as you have any FFD activity (by adding some via making a referral, or using some by paying a bill) then the expiry date on your entire FFD balance resets back to the full 90 days.
So at a minimum pay some bill (or a part of one at least) once every 3 months to keep them alive :)

Can I pay the same bill from two accounts? Like from my spouse's account? and should I use a different card?
Have not had any confirmed reports of people paying with the same exact card on two Plastiq accounts, BUT
a) I myself have paid the same bill (BC Hydro) from two Plastiq accounts using different cards, and
b) protip: you can add a supplemental card to your spouse's Plastiq account and avoid any worries about having "the exact same" credit card on two Plastiq accounts while still allowing you to pay the same bill from two Plastiq accounts from the same credit card account :) (hattip to TorontoEh)
Last edited by ace604 on Aug 10th, 2016 11:30 pm, edited 2 times in total.
POLL: How frequent is your RRSP-matching?
Plastiq: Pay any bill with credit card for 0-2.5% fee (help meet min spending and keep old cards active!)
Rewards program transfer times (e.g. SPG->Aeroplan, Marriott->SPG, Amex MR->SPG...)
Deal Addict
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Aug 9, 2013
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Anyone paid their OSAP through Plastiq? What's the fee?
Deal Guru
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Aug 8, 2012
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Macy69 points out (in another thread) that there were a few threads discussing Plastiq already. Don't know why I didn't find them.
macy69 wrote: There have been several past discussions. If you're consolidating to a single thread, you should link in the historical ones

plastiq-pay-any-bill-credit-card-0-2-5- ... a-1703429/

plastiq-pay-any-bill-credit-card-0-2-5- ... e-1795681/

plastiq-pay-any-bill-credit-card-0-2-5- ... v-1814585/
POLL: How frequent is your RRSP-matching?
Plastiq: Pay any bill with credit card for 0-2.5% fee (help meet min spending and keep old cards active!)
Rewards program transfer times (e.g. SPG->Aeroplan, Marriott->SPG, Amex MR->SPG...)
Deal Expert
Mar 25, 2005
22691 posts
3682 upvotes
Troydabes wrote: Anyone paid their OSAP through Plastiq? What's the fee?
Use the Canadian tire card for free.
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Thanks for the suggestion, but that's a bit different than the goal/point of Plastiq (for most RFDers) which will be to earn points worth more, or to meet minimum spending on their card that pays a big signup bonus.

e.g. $5,000 to get 40,000 Amex membership reward points on the business gold card (worth $400-800 depending on usage).
$1,500 to get 25,000 on Personal Gold, etc...
POLL: How frequent is your RRSP-matching?
Plastiq: Pay any bill with credit card for 0-2.5% fee (help meet min spending and keep old cards active!)
Rewards program transfer times (e.g. SPG->Aeroplan, Marriott->SPG, Amex MR->SPG...)
Member
Mar 9, 2015
234 posts
102 upvotes
Aldergrove, BC
Are you able to use a U.S based CC to pay a CND bill?
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Apr 28, 2012
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QC
Hydro Quebec: 1.5% fee, Mastercard
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jcb928 wrote: Are you able to use a U.S based CC to pay a CND bill?
YES! I actually paid several hundred dollars of my property taxes this year on my US SPG Amex to meet the minimum spend :-)
POLL: How frequent is your RRSP-matching?
Plastiq: Pay any bill with credit card for 0-2.5% fee (help meet min spending and keep old cards active!)
Rewards program transfer times (e.g. SPG->Aeroplan, Marriott->SPG, Amex MR->SPG...)
Jr. Member
Sep 3, 2011
165 posts
97 upvotes
I saw this service a while ago but have been skeptical to try. I just set up an account. Now making a payment to my university, or above mentioned merchants like BC Hydro, I get a fee of 0.00%. I doubt that is correct, how do you see the fee each merchant charges?

EDIT: Realized you have to add a card before it shows the fee. If anyone wondering the same thing, add a card first
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Jul 12, 2005
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Peterborough
Thanks Ace for setting this thread. I had been thinking of signing up for this to determine whether it was worth using to pay federal tax installments. Turns out: kinda.

Mastercard = 1.74%
Visa = 1.99%
Amex = 2.50%

If you are an employee and make payroll contributions to taxes this might not be worth setting up. If, however, you are a business owner you can make installment payments of both personal and corporate taxes though Plastiq. So, if you have a 2% cashback card like the MBNA Rewards World Elite you could get some straight cashback for paying taxes, without a special promo rate.

i.e.
$10,000.00 payment * 1.74% Plastiq fee = $174.00
$10,174.00 payment * 2.00% cashback = $203.48
Gain: $29.48

Not bad for getting an extra month to pay your taxes.
Freedom Mobile, Simplii, EQ and Wealthsimple, customer
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Just tried to some recipients and see how much is the fee on it. It turns out that OSAP (Tuition and Education Services) and apartment rent (Rent, Mortgage and real estate) is 2.25% :( So, they based the fee on what category is the payment?
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Troydabes wrote: Just tried to some recipients and see how much is the fee on it. It turns out that OSAP (Tuition and Education Services) and apartment rent (Rent, Mortgage and real estate) is 2.25% :( So, they based the fee on what category is the payment?
It's based on which payee *and* which credit card type. Which type of credit card did you try? Visa? MC? Amex?
POLL: How frequent is your RRSP-matching?
Plastiq: Pay any bill with credit card for 0-2.5% fee (help meet min spending and keep old cards active!)
Rewards program transfer times (e.g. SPG->Aeroplan, Marriott->SPG, Amex MR->SPG...)
Deal Addict
Nov 10, 2005
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Vancouver
Someone reported BC Hydro as 1.75%, but I got 2.25% for MC and 2.5% for Amex.
Weird how I was charged different rates even for same card type and same payee.
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vipjn wrote: Someone reported BC Hydro as 1.75%, but I got 2.25% for MC and 2.5% for Amex.
Weird how I was charged different rates even for same card type and same payee.
That was actually me, I got 1.50% for MC for BC Hydro. Did you choose a pre-existing BC Hydro payee that showed as "electronic" payment? Or make your own (or choose another one) that was mailing in a cheque?
POLL: How frequent is your RRSP-matching?
Plastiq: Pay any bill with credit card for 0-2.5% fee (help meet min spending and keep old cards active!)
Rewards program transfer times (e.g. SPG->Aeroplan, Marriott->SPG, Amex MR->SPG...)
Deal Guru
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Yep, just double-checked, still 1.5%. Do you see "electronically" ??

Left sidebar:

"RECIPIENT CONTACT INFO:

https://www.bchydro.com/
800 224 9376

SENT ELECTRONICALLY TO:

BC Hydro
333 Dunsmuir
Vancouver, BC V6B 5R3, CA
Payments Delivered in 3 - 6 Business Days"

Right side info: "Plastiq Fee: 1.50%"


EDIT: HOLD UP, maybe not ... I have some FFD's and it just happened to report the total rate as 1.5%. It looks like MC rate is showing as 2.50% now for BC Hydro??
I'm not sure if this is a side-effect of mixed FFD/non-FFD payment (I just inflated the bill payment to a larger amount than my FFD balance to check). Odd.
When I opened the account a couple months ago and did my first payment it was 1.50% for MC to BC Hydro.


EDIT2: Nevermind, LOL. Had default set to Amex. I get 2.50% Amex, 1.50% MC. Numbers in table in OP are still correct for my payment confirmation.
POLL: How frequent is your RRSP-matching?
Plastiq: Pay any bill with credit card for 0-2.5% fee (help meet min spending and keep old cards active!)
Rewards program transfer times (e.g. SPG->Aeroplan, Marriott->SPG, Amex MR->SPG...)
Deal Addict
Nov 10, 2005
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Vancouver
ace604 wrote: That was actually me, I got 1.50% for MC for BC Hydro. Did you choose a pre-existing BC Hydro payee that showed as "electronic" payment? Or make your own (or choose another one) that was mailing in a cheque?
It could be why. The pre-existing one has an address on Dunsmuir St, and the payment page of BC Hydro has a PO Box address, so I added one to be safe. I will try picking the pre-existing one to see if the fees lower. Thanks for letting me know.
Have you seen Amex fee lower than 2.5%?
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vipjn wrote: It could be why. The pre-existing one has an address on Dunsmuir St, and the payment page of BC Hydro has a PO Box address, so I added one to be safe. I will try picking the pre-existing one to see if the fees lower. Thanks for letting me know.
Have you seen Amex fee lower than 2.5%?
Yes, OP table shows BC Hydro 2.25% for Amex (confirmed by me, the OP :) )

I did the same thing with a property tax before ... the address didn't match for my city, my city has a PO box in another City as its payment address. If it's already listed in the system, and you click through and it says "sent electroncially" then they are already good to go with that payee so don't worry about the address being "wrong", no cheque is sent! :)

EDIT: Ha ha, wait a sec... I just got 2.5% for Amex, but my confirmed initial Plastiq usage shows 2.25%. Hmm, wonder if that changed??
POLL: How frequent is your RRSP-matching?
Plastiq: Pay any bill with credit card for 0-2.5% fee (help meet min spending and keep old cards active!)
Rewards program transfer times (e.g. SPG->Aeroplan, Marriott->SPG, Amex MR->SPG...)
Deal Addict
Nov 25, 2002
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Brampton
The rates have fluctuated in the last year.

I had set up recurring payments to Brampton Property Tax on my Amex Biz Gold in November 2015 for a year @ 1.74%. When I tried to change it last month to use my wife's Amex Biz Gold (to meet her spending requirements), it jumped to 2.5%.

Fortunately, I was able to live chat with them and get them to update the CC while maintaining the rate.

I also have recurring payments to Brampton Property Tax from December 2016 onwards on my MC @ 1.5% (set up in late 2015), but it jumps to 2.25% if I try to edit the payment or even change to another MC.

Also, when they had a promotion for 0% fee on recurring utility payments some time last year, I had set up estimated payments to Hydro One Brampton, Enbridge and Region of Peel Water for 3 years on by MBNA RWE (it would only allow me to do it until the card's expiry date). Brampton Property Tax didn't count for that promo.
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ace604 wrote: It's based on which payee *and* which credit card type. Which type of credit card did you try? Visa? MC? Amex?
It was on Master Card. It seems like I made a mistake. There's a payee for OSAP. I just made a mistake lol It was 1.74%. I think I really need to get a 2% per $1 credit card. It seems like the fee is cheaper if it was sent electronically than sending cheques (well, duh)

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