Bilt made some changes to ‘BILT SERVICES TERMS OF USE‘, eagle eyed reader David points out the following change (emphasis ours):
You acknowledge that Bilt has a policy whereby it may hard reject (i) any individual rent payment in an amount over $20,000 (unless you contact Bilt at support@biltrewards.com for approval prior to initiating the transaction) and (ii) any attempt to make more than one rent payment to one payee within a 30 day period (exclusive of NSFs or blocked or returned payments). Rejected payments may result in you incurring fees or penalties from your property manager or other third party service providers.
There was some concerns that this would lead to a blocked payment where a convenience fee is charged by the landlord. We reached out to Bilt and they provided the following statement:
Since the beginning, Bilt was founded to make rent rewarding for our members by enabling customers to earn rewards on their monthly rent payment. Bilt’s language in our Terms and Conditions as well as Bilt’s broader transaction monitoring is designed, among other things, on preventing abuse of Bilt Rent Payments. For example, if a landlord charges a small ACH fee, that charge + your monthly rent payment will process without issue. Similarly, if you choose to break up your rent payment to the same landlord into 2 smaller payments, that will also process without issue. In a similar vein, payments made in February and March will process without issue.
To summarize, the transaction monitoring is designed to help prevent abuse. To further help our members, Bilt will let the member know by email if a subsequent rent payment is at risk of rejection (and to contact support if they believe this is in error)
It seems the change in terms is designed to block additional payments for items such as utilities rather than legitimate rent payments/convenience fees.
View Comments (36)
Paypal yourself the lump sum of your previous multiple rents as your one rent payment?
Technically they seem to have implemented this on the ACH account. I paid rent ACH and I was trying to pay rent for another property through Venmo. That transaction got declined in May. I just tried to Pay venmo and that went through so if I tried to do the rent payment, there is a chance that’ll get declined.
This is ridiculous. My credit limit is much lower than my rent (NYC). I had to split it into 2 payments. Now I need to open biltprotection and can't use the credit limit anymore! That somewhat relieved me from crazy rent.
Just did some double checking on my end. The original message you could get while chatting their chat bot that listed all the things you could use the BILT Rent Account (routing and account number) for is now just down to "...charges may include rent, or additional charges from your landlord, like utilities or maintenance.). Used to have things like HOA Fees, Electric Bill, Gas Bill, Condo Fees, Cell Phone Payment, among a whole lot of other things. Safe to say they were probably shelling out way too many points for those other "rent-related" charges.
What about in February only have 28 days😅
i never used it. who can say - can I pay my rent with credit card? Are there any fees?
It's a great card. You can pay rent with the card, they provide ACH routing numbers so that your rent portal won't change any credit card fees. Bilt itself does not charge any fees.
I just submitted a ticket with support. I've been using my rent account for my other 3 utility bills for several months now. Will update when I get word back
Further clarificaiton:
"We understand you've been using the Bilt Rent Account for the designated charges, but currently, only one rent or rent-related payment can be made per month using this account. Therefore, you must carefully select the payment you wish to utilize the Bilt Rent Account for."
Seems like they're serious about a 1 transaction limit. Guess it was nice while it lasted. Now this card will just be for rent and Amazon reloads. We'll see how long this program lasts
Only hope this can last longer. prepaid utilities just be fine. just rent and Amazon reloads. or one time paid 2 months, and paid utilities with a big amounts in another month
Initial response from support:
"At Bilt, we take great care to adhere to our terms and conditions and diligently verify all charges made through the Bilt Rent Account. As rental statements can differ, we inspect each payment thoroughly to ensure accuracy. Using the rent account with multiple transactions can potentially get them flagged.
If you present any inconveniences, you can send us screenshots of the transactions in case they get blocked, so we can further investigate to better assist you."
Still pushing for further clarification.
I find this whole thing pretty ridiculous since the majority of renters, at least in my area, don't pay for all utilities and rent in one giant lump sum. They have at least 2-4 separate transactions/accounts based on how utilities are set up in the city. Legitimate customers are going to drop this card if they're getting their accounts flagged with some regularity for purchases in line with the terms
Please do. We pay our rent + electricity + HOA fees (4 transactions total) and we are wondering it this will be continue to be allowed or would be considered abuse?
Thank you for reporting this. No other major sites that usually cheerleaders for Bilt mentioned anything. If Kerr would've not been associated with Bilt, there would be very little attention paid to this card. A niche card from an odd bank with no avenue to generate meaningful amount of points
Goodbye, trash
Bye.
From the bolded text, it seems like you can only make one payment to a single payee per 30 days. But you can make a rent/other payment to another payee other than your landlord; right?
Yes, I read it the same way. The terms referenced in the post were last changed May 1. I have not had any issues this month with making separate rent + utilities charges.
I just had my electric charge get declined yesterday. I had paid rent + HOA earlier in the month.