Overdue Payment on Credit Card in the US

In this first post since opening durumis, I mentioned that I've largely based it on the framework of Tistory. While the total number of posts there is less than a hundred, it did contain some useful information and tips about living in the US, so I'm planning to recreate them here one by one. Since a direct copy-paste would hurt search engine results, I'll be rewriting these posts with a fresh perspective.

Here's how it happened. Last spring, I set up autopay for my mother's internet and phone bills. Unfortunately, because of this autopay setup (which deducts the payment mid-month), and due to her paying her credit card bill around the middle of the month, we missed the deadline by just one day. My heart sank, but after an internet search, I found that...if it was a first-time mistake and credit is good, late fees and interest can be waived.This information appeared in various places.

Ideally, I should have called customer service and explained the situation, but I was worried my poor English pronunciation would hinder clear communication. So, I tried to resolve the issue through the website. Using the chatbot, I successfully got the late fee waived, receiving a confirmation message a mere 0.00001 seconds after clicking "waive." It was incredibly efficient.

The subsequent credit card statement? Bill? Whatever it's called, the statement (in English) showed that the late fee and interest were deducted on the same day I resolved the issue online. A netizen's comment, "Don't worry too much if it's your first time making a mistake; your life isn't ruined!" finally resonated and brought me comfort.

It's important to remember that habitual late payments will result in rejection of a late fee waiver request. Since I personally pay all our household bills and credit card payments, this one-day oversight was possible. Because of this incident, we now pay our credit card bills a bit earlier than usual, just to prevent repeating the same mistake.