Opinion The green bill
Its time all of us thought a bit about reducing our carbon footprints and going green.
Its time all of us thought a bit about reducing our carbon footprints and going green. No,it wont be easy for you to set up solar panels or build green houses,but there are some things we can do which can collectively make a huge impact on the earths fortunes.
What,you might ask. Well,its simple. Just think of the number of paper bills and bank statements that you accumulate every month,only to be thrown away as waste. We see just the paper,and forget their environmental cost — the trees that were cut,the energy that was used to process and then print it,and finally the fuel spent to bring the bill to you.
You first bit towards sustaining the earths green cover and thus over lives,can be asking all your service providers to send you their bills online. This is a very easy thing to do with mobile phone companies,banks and Internet service providers. Most of their websites let customers easily opt for e-statements and bills,thus saving the companies a lot of money and the earth a lot of pain. You can also pay the amounts online,thus avoiding a lot of unnecessary paperwork and movement.
However,when it comes to utilities like power companies,an e-bill is almost impossible now. But,here,you can make a difference by paying the bills online. In Delhi,you can easily pay your power and phone bills online,provided you have an Internet banking account or credit card. I am sure this works for most big cities in India. An e-payment is beneficial for you too,as some of the utilities give a small concession to those who dont queue up in front of their bill desks every month.
When it comes to banks,think twice before running to a nearest branch for every small transaction. With an Internet banking account,you can do most of these from the comfort of your home or office. Money transfers,standing orders,draft requests can all be done online,negating the need for ledgers and books thankfully most banks have got rid of these now and more importantly unnecessary travel. And every time you use the ATM,just dont print a receipt which you will shred to pieces within seconds.
Insurance premiums,rail,air and movie tickets,hotel reservations can all be made online now. Its just that some of us are still not comfortable about handling money online. But consider the fact that every time you do something online you are saving a bit of paper somewhere,and maybe you will have a good reason to shift to world of cyber payments.
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