Jake (Jack Elam) and Sheriff Jason McCullough (James Garner) decide how to divvy up future gold mining spoils in Support Your Local Sheriff!Isn't it wonderful that utility companies (say Questar Gas) and municipalities (say the City of St. George, Utah) love to charge "convenience fees" if you choose to pay your bill online on their web sites using a credit card? (For the sarcasm impaired, quit reading now.)

From the movie Support Your Local Sheriff!:Now I ask: "Convenient for whom? You mean convenient for you and costly for me!"

There's absolutely nothing convenient about paying more money just for the privilege of paying a bill. Nothing at all.

Yes, I understand that accepting credit card payments does mean the credit card company takes a small bite out of the paid amount. If that was a valid excuse, big retailers would charge a "convenience fee" for swiping a credit card at the cash register. Instead any cost overhead is built into the overall cost infrastructure. Why can't municipalities and utility companies do the same?

In fact, it may be argued that processing of traditional pay-by-mail or drive-up paper-check payments may be more expensive in time (human resources) and thus money than a quick electronic transaction, even with transaction fee overheads.

Since St. George and Questar both want to charge me extra for me making things simpler (no manual check processing), I'll stick with using my bank's free online bill pay system. That means that unless each company has set up an electronic bill-pay acceptance system with whatever processing or clearinghouse my bank uses, they'll keep getting a paper check in the mail printed out by my bank.

Why did I want to use a credit card in the first place? Well I like to earn "cash back" by using a card to pay for everything then paying the entire new balance off each month to avoid any fees or interest. All while my paycheck sits accumulating interest in a savings account until it's time to make that monthly credit card payment.

Yup, I'm cheap that way. I love to save and earn an extra buck.

I love cash back. I even went for the Costco Executive Membership just to get the annual 2% reward, and now the membership more than pays for itself every year. Sweet!

Bottom line? I hate "convenience fees" of any sort. They're not convenient. Especially when electronic payments make things more convenient for the organization doing the charging.

Tell you what, Questar and St. George, how about I send you a bill. The line-item will be an "annoyance fee" I charge all billers who want to charge me for the privilege of paying them. I'd go for it if you'd pay up!