Anonymous fees

Ever look at your cell phone bill and think - "what the heck is that $3 for?". That's exactly what being billed by some of the larger state universities is for classes. I kid you not - here's a list of charges I got:

09/04/2008 Credit Card Convenience
09/04/2008 Payment-Credit Card-Thank You
09/02/2008 Emply Waiver UH RA/TA
09/02/2008 Fee - Academic Service, Grad
09/02/2008 Fee - Computer Tech-Grad
09/02/2008 Fee - Instruct. Acc&Sup-Grad
09/02/2008 Fee - Library-Grad
09/02/2008 Fee - Utility Assessment-Grad
09/02/2008 TUIT-PHD-CLASS-NON-RESIDENT
08/29/2008 GATF FELLOWSHIP
08/27/2008 Emply Waiver UH RA/TA
08/27/2008 Fee - Academic Service, Grad
08/27/2008 Fee - Computer Tech-Grad
08/27/2008 Fee - Graduate/Prof.Enrollment
08/27/2008 Fee - Id Card-Grad
08/27/2008 Fee - Instruct. Acc&Sup-Grad
08/27/2008 Fee - International Edu-Grad
08/27/2008 Fee - Library-Grad
08/27/2008 Fee - Rec & Well Ct-Grad
08/27/2008 Fee - Student Services-Grad
08/27/2008 Fee - University Center-Grad
08/27/2008 Fee - Utility Assessment-Grad
08/27/2008 Late Registration
08/27/2008 TUIT-PHD-CLASS-NON-RESIDENT - Doctoral Dissertation

Lets look at some of the truly absurd charges:

ID CARD: I get charged for having a student ID card -- even though they made it years ago - they charge me just to have it and have it keep a line in their Microsoft SQL database. I don't use it for anything - it's just a line that says I have a card.

Credit Card Convenience: I get charged to pay my bill if I want to use a credit card. It's roughly 1.5% which is of course more than my cashback bonus.

Late Registration Fee: $20 - how can I get charged a late fee on 8/27 if the last day to register is 8/29? Enter the truly absurd.

Now lets figure out the other conundrum that confuses me. Why is my fee bill different from other people who take the same number of classes? That's right - same credit hours - different fee bill. We're both out of state - we're both PhD candidates. No explanations.

They probably figure that most of their students don't give money back - so they'll try to make the money off of us now.