Citi to Cardholders: Go Paperless or Else

livemint.com:

Some Citigroup credit-card customers are getting a stark warning from the bank: Go paperless or lose access to your online account. Banks and credit-card companies have been nudging customers to give up paper statements for years. Aside from the environmental benefits of not printing millions of pages, banks have said switching to digital statements is also a cost-saving measure.

Citi’s policy is one of the harshest yet for the holdouts. The effort is part of a beta program rolled out to a small number of customers who access accounts online but still get paper statements, a Citigroup representative said. The bank didn’t say how many customers received these messages.

Though the policy requires customers to enroll in paperless billing to continue using their account online, they can switch back to paper later and retain access to the bank’s site and app, the representative said. Barry Schneider had ignored prodding from banks to give up paper statements over the years, as he prefers to track his finances the old-fashioned way. When he logged in to pay his credit-card bill last month, Citi gave him the ultimatum.

If he wanted to keep receiving monthly paper statements, he would have to start making check payments by mail, too. “We’re requiring you to go Paperless to maintain digital access to your account," the site said. Attorneys and consumer advocates say the policy tests the limits of federal laws that require credit-card companies to mail customers paper statements at least once a month, unless they opt out in favor of digital delivery.