While consumer use of electronic bill presentment and payment (EBPP) is on the rise, paper checks remain a hard habit for most Americans to break, according to a new survey by TowerGroup, Needham, Mass.

The research and advisory services company surveyed nearly 4,000 households, weighted by age and income to represent all U.S. households. Some highlights:

* More consumers are looking at their bills online. In 2002, 20 percent of U.S. consumers have viewed electronic bills or billing statements online-versus only 1 percent in 1998.

* The use of online bill payment continues to grow. In 2002, 13 percent of all U.S. consumers used online bill payment-versus only 2 percent of households in 1998. In total, households that use online bill payment are currently paying an average of 3.7 bills per month via the Internet.

* Despite changes in behavior, paper checks are still a hard habit to break-even for active online bankers or bill payers. Today, 41 percent of online banking users still prefer to write checks and use the U.S. mail for bill payment purposes. The same hold true for 26 percent of the households using Internet bill payment.