Help your parents monitor accounts and pay bills

Jeremy Nachtigall • February 10, 2021

Many of our parents still write checks and mail their bills. Get your parents on automatic bill-pay for the utilities, credit cards and any other providers who bill at regular intervals. Where some providers aren't offering an auto pay option, you may be able to schedule bills to automatically be drafted directly from your parents’ checking account. 


Although not as prevalent today, some of our parents still keep deposit accounts at multiple banks. They might have multiple whole life insurance policies (that they don’t even remember taking out) or several brokerage accounts. Everyone's life will be easier and less stressful if some of those accounts are consolidated.

Consolidating a brokerage account is fairly straightforward, and requires a signature on an ACAT (Account Transfer) form that can be obtained from your parents’ financial advisor. If it’s not feasible to consolidate accounts, at least maintain a list of all of the accounts and account numbers and store all documents related to those accounts in one location. This will make it easier to stay on top of everything. 


Next article: Get permission to handle financial transactions for your parents

First article: Financial Caregiving in the age of Coronavirus


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