A few hours could save you hundreds this year!
Spring cleaning isn’t just for your house—it’s also a good idea for your finances, too. That’s why I’m taking a few hours this week to check up on my subscription spending and figure out if I really need all those streaming services, monthly deliveries, and other recurring expenses that keep cropping up on my credit cards. The average American spends more than $1,000 on subscriptions every year, so it’s worth the effort to review what you’re paying for.
Ready to clean up your finances? Follow these steps to help you save.
Check the Last Year of Bills
While it’s easy to tally up the monthly subscriptions by just looking at your current bank and credit card statements, you’ll miss any subscriptions and memberships that are only charged annually. So you’ll want to go through a full year of statements for any one-time subscription charges. Now is the perfect time to do this, since you might already be reviewing last year’s bills to prep your taxes. Flag anything that looks like it might be a subscription.
Decide If It’s Worth It
Some subscriptions and services aren’t exactly optional (hello, home Wi-Fi), but for others, we walk through the list and see if we’re really getting our money’s worth. For example, we cancelled a toy-and-treat box for our dogs (who had way too many toys already) and a streaming subscription we were only using occasionally.
Some subscriptions, such as delivery services, may be more expensive to hold onto than just paying a single delivery charge each time you use them. So it might be time to break out the calculator to see if it’s worth it.
Look for Freebies and Add-Ons
Take a look at what comes with the services you’re definitely keeping. You may be paying separately for something you can get for free through a bundle. Streaming services in particular are a very popular add-on! For instance, my parents get Netflix through their cable company, and HBO Max, NY Times Cooking, and Peacock are included through our cell provider and Instacart memberships. You may want to do a little digging to see where you can bundle subscriptions and potentially save some dough.
And don’t forget that your library offers many free services that could replace a subscription, from audio and e-books to Hoopla, which offers access to many movies and TV shows whenever you’re looking for something to watch.
Ask for a Better Deal
If you want to keep a subscription but the price is steep, you can always try contacting customer service to see if you can be given a better rate to stay on. Some services will try to keep you by giving the same deal they give new customers. And yes, you can contact them again when the price inevitably rises again after the new introductory period. We’ve literally saved hundreds of dollars on two subscriptions with this method.
Pause, Downgrade, or Cancel Some Memberships
Many subscriptions will let you pause when you’re not using them. So if you know you won’t be watching a particular streaming service until a new season of your favorite show comes along, go ahead and take a month off! I also downgrade from premium to a more basic package when we’re using it less. I’m cool with a few ads when I’m not trying to binge my way through a fresh season. And yes, you can always cancel and wait until your favorite show comes back.
To max out your money on that, if you can be patient, consider waiting until the whole show has dropped, and binge it over a single month.
