I have a home mortgage with a payment due date of the first of the month. However, a late charge is not imposed until the 16th of the month (at 7:00 P.M.) Because I want to leave my money in my interest-bearing account for as long as possible, I have my mortgage payments scheduled for payment on the 15th of the month.
I pay my bills with Fidelity Bill Pay, and have been paying that mortgage payment for quite a number of years now, exactly the same way. The Fidelity terms and conditions state they are responsible for late charges if payments don't arrive on time.
In May, I submitted my request for payment on May 15th. However, the payment was not made by Fidelity until May 19th. Therefore, I incurred a late charge from my mortgage company.
I contacted Fidelity and told them they were responsible for the late charge. They contacted my mortgage company and learned that my payment is officially due on the first of each month... Totally ignoring that there is a grace period when late charges are not imposed. They told me that because I did not ask for my payment to be made before May 1st, they were not responsible for the late charge.
I explained to them that my "official due date" is not relevant, only the date when late charges were to be imposed and the date when I asked them to pay the bill. My position was that I requested payment on the 15th, it didn't arrive until the 19th, therefore it was late and therefore they owed me the late fee. They stood by their position that in spite of when the late fee was actually to be imposed, the "official" due date of the payment was the 1st, so I was out of luck.
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