How to Make a Bill Schedule

To ensure your bills are paid on time, it is important to set up a bill payment schedule. Using Microsoft Excel, you can easily create a bill payment schedule so you can track due dates, amounts to be paid and also track when you make each payment.

Difficulty:

Easy

Instructions

1. Open a new spreadsheet and save it using the file name: Bill Payment Schedule. Type in your column headings as follows:

   Column A - Vendor
   Column B - Amount Due
   Column C - Due Date
   Column D - Date Paid

2. When you receive a paper bill or an email notification that you have an ebill, open your spreadsheet. Enter the appropriate information into each column such as the vendor name (i.e. Phone Company) and then put the amount due. Make sure you format this field for currency. To do that, highlight the field and right-click. Choose "Format" and then choose "Currency." In column C, put the date that the payment is due. It's a good idea to use an earlier date than the actual due date to make sure the payment is received by the vendor before the due date.

3. Designate a bill payment day based on when you receive your paychecks. This could be once a week, twice a month or once a month. On that day, open your spreadsheet and choose which payments you are going to make based on the due dates. For example, if you get paid on the first day of the month and the 15th of the month, choose the bills that are due before the 15th and pay them on the 1st. Do the same with the bills due near the end of the month---pay those out of your mid-month paycheck.

4. After you choose which payments you are going to make, enter the date paid in Column D. Once you enter the due date, highlight the row by clicking on the number of the row in the far left corner. Then click on the highlight button in the toolbar. It is the button with the highlighter and the small-case letters "ab."

5. Save your work often and review your spreadsheet often to make sure you don't miss any deadlines. You can also sort your information to make sure your most recent bills are at the top or the very end of the spreadsheet. Do this by highlighting all the columns. Then choose "Data" in the toolbar and click on "Sort." Choose column C as you want to sort by "Due Date." Then click "ascending order" or "descending order" depending on whether you want the recent bills to show up at the top of the spreadsheet or at the bottom.