doxo Offers a Convenient Bill-Paying Service that Keeps Control in the Consumer’s Hands and Provides a Holistic Financial View

In a Nutshell: Keeping track of monthly bills can be a real struggle. doxo offers a convenient solution that allows users to pay all their monthly bills through the company’s service, rather than logging into multiple websites — they call this bill pay independence. With doxo, the power remains in the consumer’s hands with the ability to set limits on how much to pay, so you know if your utility provider overcharges you or if your cable bill goes up. Users can choose their preferred method of payment for each bill. doxo makes it easy for new customers to get started with its rich crowd-sourced data that shows the most common monthly bills in your area, and how much other consumers are paying.

Thinking about my recurring monthly bills often sends my stress levels soaring. The wide-ranging amounts due, the due dates scattered throughout the month, and having to pay bills at different websites and juggle numerous usernames and passwords can be overwhelming.

Sure, I’ve created spreadsheets and calendars to try to track it all. But then, a due date changes or I sign up for a new service, and then never quite get around to updating my tracking sheet. Pretty soon, the whole thing is out of date, and I am faced with starting from scratch.

Thankfully, doxo offers a convenient and low-stress solution for viewing and paying bills all in one place, something the company refers to as bill pay independence.

The Seattle-based company began nearly a decade ago as a “digital file cabinet” focused primarily on managing online bills and documents. But, over the years, doxo has expanded its services to stay on top of the evolving bill pay ecosystem and bring consumers the robust offerings it has today.

Doxo CEO and Co-Founder Steve Shivers said the company was founded with the intent to bring innovation to the billing space.

“The three of us who started doxo (Shivers, Mark Goris, and Roger Parks) worked previously at different payments companies,” Shivers said. “We see a huge amount of innovation happening in fintech, in general, with companies like Square, Venmo, Apple. They’re disrupting our lives as consumers.”

Steve Shivers is the CEO and a Co-Founder of Seattle company doxo.

But, Shivers said, he and his co-founders realized that the one part of their lives that had not been touched by the fintech upswell was in bill payment.

“That part of the economy was stuck in the stone ages. It was almost the same as it had been 20 years ago,” he said. “We saw this gap in the market where we could build a bridge and leapfrog over this slow-moving industry.”

Shivers said that users generally have two options for paying bills online. Customers can go to each company website they do business with, log in, and pay their bills. The other option, which is decreasing in popularity he said, is paying bills through their bank’s bill pay service. This option is limiting because you can only pay with accounts through that bank.

Now, with doxo, consumers can keep track of all their bills in one place and pay through that same place.

“It’s challenging for consumers to stay on top of all their bills,” Shivers said. “The average household has more than 10 bills each month. And they’re set up to be paid on different days. Consumers change banks or get new cards. It’s a lot to keep up with.”

He said this type of situation can lead consumers to bad outcomes, like not having enough money to cover the next upcoming bill or simply forgetting to pay a bill, which can result in late fees and possibly impact the consumer’s credit.

He said doxo can help consumers get a better grasp of their finances because of the services’ ability to let them see all their bills and finances in one place. Consumers can manage their cash flow and credit better, he said.

“We work with over 45,000 billers that you can pay through doxo,” Shiver said. “And we can help you set up every due date so you can keep track of when to pay.”

“We give the user control over everything,” Shivers said. “You can set up multiple payment accounts in doxo and select which one to use. Maybe you have a credit card you want to use to earn more rewards — you can do that.”

He said the company built the product around the user’s needs, and there is no one-size-fits-all solution because consumer priorities and preferences vary so widely.

More than 50,000 billers work with doxo so customers can easily pay online.

“We let you set it up, so you can decide when you’re sending the money,” he said. “We make sure everything is transparent to the user. If they give us their due dates, we’ll make sure they get notifications to pay on time.”

He said it’s also very easy to switch payment methods from month to month. For example, if a consumer paid his or her cellphone bill with a debit card this month but needs to pay with a credit card next month, the change can be made any time and only takes a few seconds.

“And we actually move the money from your account to the biller over the path that’s the most efficient for you and the biller,” Shivers said. “As the consumer, you can pay in your preferred method and then for the biller, they get paid directly, fast and free, whether they prefer that be through a bank draft or even a paper check.”

Shivers said some consumers are hesitant to sign up for automated bill pay services because it takes the control out of their hands. They have concerns like what if a bill is higher than expected and they don’t have the money to cover it, or what if the biller overcharges the customer and they don’t realize it?

With doxo, Shivers said customers can maintain control even with automated payments. The service allows consumers to set limits on their payments. He said, for example, a consumer can put a limit of $150 on the electricity bill. Then, if the bill is higher than the set amount, the customer will be notified so he or she can investigate.

Shivers said getting started with doxo is simple.

He said when users create an account through the doxo website or the mobile app, they will be greeted with a wizard that helps guide them through the process of setting up their various bill accounts.

“By setting up your ZIP code, we are able to automatically know what those most common bills are, based on other users in your area,” Shivers said. “We’re going to know your power company, your water company, your trash company, your cable company. And, we’ll suggest those to you so it’s just a click to add each of them.”

Payment platform doxo is designed with the customer as a hub with spokes reaching out as connections to billers.

He said doxo then goes down a list of other most common bills in the user area and even provides information like showing users what the five most common auto insurance providers are for their area.

“The most fundamental and most powerful component of doxo is that it’s designed to be crowdsourced,” Shivers said. “So, the more people are using doxo, the data gets deeper and it becomes easier for everybody else.”

doxo is designed so the customer is the hub and the spokes are the connections to the billers, Shivers said. Similar to social media accounts that identify and suggest potential relationships, doxo makes connections as well.

“doxo is doing that except people already have their billers. Those aren’t relationships that doxo creates,” he said. “What we’re doing is creating the map or the graph of those relationships so with each person that joins, we’re becoming more intelligent and making it easier to add your accounts.”

He said, ultimately, the more people who using doxo and providing that insight, the easier it becomes for other users to manage their billing and make their lives easier.

Shivers said doxo has always held data security as one of its top priorities, but with several national high-profile data breaches in the news in recent years, it has become a growing concern for customers, as well.

He said the company wants to ensure users that their information is safe. Data is encrypted and protected using industry-standard encryption measures. And, he said doxo never gives out any payment information to billers. This is also appealing to billers because they don’t have to worry about any liability associated with the potential of users’ information being compromised.

Additionally, user payments are monitored every step of the way and users will be notified immediately if there is ever an issue. doxo also maintains a complete history of every payment associated with each user’s account.

With doxo, I know I can help keep stress down to healthy levels and feel assured that my data is safe, as well.