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Having my pay delayed would cause me problems precisely because I budget well. On payday I have 20+ automatic transfers into various accounts (utilities, car, mortgage, etc) leaving my chequing account with only enough to service my automatic for the month. If my pay is late my transfers will fail and automatic payments will either leave me in overdraft or will fail (I'm not sure which, because it has never happened).

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Isn't this a JIT buffer problem?

You have optimized the slack out of your payments system, and can't handle disruptions

Maybe, but where I live there are very serious penalties for my employer if they fail to pay me on time even once. And I can and will be made whole. And it has never happened in my 15+ years operating this way.

Whatever works for you, but you really should have a buffer. Mistakes happen. Serious penalties won't fix that.

I would argue you're not budgeting well if your budget doesn't have any buffer room for mistakes or emergencies. I would think this would be fairly obvious.

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