Electricity, phone and gas
When it is time to pay the electricity, phone and gas most people are used to getting a bill in their mailbox or just having money drawn from their accounts. If you are one of those people and are moving to China you’ve better read this. You will not receive a bill and they will not automatically withdraw money from your account in the end of the month. You will have to go to the bank and charge a special card. There are different cards for electricity and gas so bring the right one. At the bank you can choose which amount you want to charge the card with. Then you go back to your building and have someone call the responsible person for charging your meter. Be sure to charge the right apartment otherwise you will have happy neighbors. After this, the electricity starts ticking down and you’ll have to keep an eye on how much you have left. When the electricity is used up it is simply turned off. The same procedure extends to the gas but there can be a difference in which bank you can charge the different cards. This you’ll have to research depending on where you live.
The phone you can either pay at the bank or at the phone company’s office. If you also wish to have internet this will be extra. Most often you pay a monthly fee which will give you internet for one month and then it will shut down. Do not do the mistake and think this means you won’t have to pay since you don’t have access to the service anymore. As long as you don’t tell the company that you don’t desire their service anymore they will keep on charging your account even though they have turned off your access. Sounds strange? Well you can always try to argue but it will not get you further than to the bank. Whether your landlord gives you a big bill or the phone company come knocking on your door you will have to pay. So be careful with just assuming things when it comes to paying bills in China.
For some it might seem a bit complicated with this system but from an environmental perspective it might be the best solution. Lets assume that there are about 250 000 000 households in China and they receive 3 bills (phone, electricity and gas) every month, that would ad up to 750 000 000 bills per month. Since it goes 14 000 regular writing papers on one tree that would be 53 571 trees per month. On a whole year you would have to chop down 642 852 trees and then we haven’t even thought about the envelops. So in other words, if we want to keep the forests we should gladly go to the bank and pay our bills.
