We are so irresponsible we forget about subscriptions?

[GoodSteward]

While reading about budgeting apps(I know, I'm a nerd. It's shameful)I came across this.

"Trim uses your credit card and bank transactions to inform you of long-forgotten subscriptions. "

Really? We have a financial crisis of paying for subscriptions and forgetting about them, letting them charge us for nothing? Is society getting so irresponsible that they need a program to help them remember to cancel something they don't use, and it's so needed its in a list of financial apps recommended for budgeting?

Wow.....

[maryadavies]

My grandmother was like that. We are actually throwing away a magazine that she'd had a subscription to for a very long time (and kept renewing) since it's one you can read free in the library. (She died about a year or two ago.)

We are NOT getting it renewed when it finally comes up, but since it was prepaid for a couple years, we'll have to keep throwing it out for now. I don't think it autobills her accounts, I hope. If not we'll have to cancel the darned thing.

[kork13]

We are NOT getting it renewed when it finally comes up, but since it was prepaid for a couple years, we'll have to keep throwing it out for now. I don't think it autobills her accounts, I hope. If not we'll have to cancel the darned thing.

Just call the company, tell them she has passed, and ask them to cancel her subscription. They may or may not refund some of the subscription fee, but I'd be satisfied just to get them to stop coming.

We recently purchased a new home, and are continually receiving magazines & shopping catalogs for the previous owners. Every time a new one shows up I get on their website, or call the company, and ask them to stop sending the magazine to my address. It's a minor inconvenience, but again, I'd rather have them stop showing up & cluttering my mailbox. But to the original point -- these folks literally had at least 4 magazine subscriptions (that I've seen so far), plus they were on at least a half-dozen mailing lists! It's crazy!

My main credit card (Citi Double Cash) has a really nice website feature -- it automatically highlights the recurring charges. I know what all of them on there are (Utilities, Netflix, DW's DSC, and such like that).... But I do appreciate that their website makes obvious what might be obscure/forgotten to some folks.

[GoodSteward]

The subscriptions I'm thinking of are all these services and entertainments we have now. Everything is going subscription based. I can understand how easy it is to stack up on them, but to have ones you don't remember and don't see for yourself to cancel? That means they are not paying attention to either their cc or bank statements. That's why this is such a red flag to me. The app monitors your transactions and looks for these subscriptions. That's why I found it so troubling to see this.

[GoodSteward]

My main credit card (Citi Double Cash) has a really nice website feature -- it automatically highlights the recurring charges. I know what all of them on there are (Netflix, DW's DSC, and such like that).... But I do appreciate that their website makes obvious what might be obscure/forgotten to some folks.

I might be the odd ball that uses a spreadsheet to list everything, including those subscriptions, so I am prepared for the payment in advance. I go by the "every dollar has a job" mentality, at least in theory. Everything I know about I have listed. YNAB(budgeting program I use) is meant to organize your money, but I still prefer to plan my checks to know where the money goes into a category. So, I have a spreadsheet that breaks down all my checks and I just fill in the blanks leaving some room for unknowns. When I get paid, I just fill in the categories per the sheet and go on. On this sheet has all my monthly bills, so I know what is going on.

The subscriptions that are not monthly might be more easily forgotten like the shave clubs that might be every other month, or every three. If you changed to doing something else, you could forget, but it would only take me getting them in the mail once to cancel it.

[Nutria]

The subscriptions that are not monthly might be more easily forgotten like the shave clubs that might be every other month, or every three. If you changed to doing something else, you could forget, but it would only take me getting them in the mail once to cancel it.

Who remembers every yearly subscription? (To companies, that's a huge benefit to companies.)

I might be the odd ball that uses a spreadsheet to list everything, including those subscriptions, so I am prepared for the payment in advance. I go by the "every dollar has a job" mentality, at least in theory. Everything I know about I have listed.

I also subscribe to the EDHAJ school of budgeting. It's why my Savings spreadsheet has so many columns.

Any subscription that's more than $100/year goes in our Savings_2017 spreadsheet, and usually has a monthly 1/12th xfer from checking to savings for that purpose. We've already weeded out the subscriptions that we don't use.

The others get cash flowed.

[GoodSteward]

Any subscription that's more than $100/year goes in our Savings_2017 spreadsheet, and usually has a monthly 1/12th xfer from checking to savings for that purpose. We've already weeded out the subscriptions that we don't use.

The others get cash flowed.

I do the same thing. Our trash pickup is paid quarterly, but I have 1/3 listed on my sheet to build up each month.

[Outdoorsygal]

My experience is you cancel the subscription yet it too often not cancelled.

This might be a handy reminder app that the effort to cancel was in vain

So try try again

[Nutria]

I do the same thing. Our trash pickup is paid quarterly, but I have 1/3 listed on my sheet to build up each month.

Bimonthly, with and estimated 1/2 each month sent to Savings (really a checking account). I have CheckFree cut a check from that account instead of the standard checking acct.

[StormRichards]

The type of people that forget about subscriptions are probably the same people that say "it's only money."

Personally, we don't have a lot of subscriptions. Each of our monthly subscriptions get a line in our bills spreadsheet, so there is no forgetting about them. An amount is not entered into a monthly column until the bill is paid, so that $34.95/month I pay for the gym is not copied across until I reconcile the Visa bill it is charged to.

[Cardmines52]

Wow, I have never known that.

[Mjenn]

My experience is you cancel the subscription yet it too often not cancelled.

This might be a handy reminder app that the effort to cancel was in vain

So try try again

This has happened to us. Adobe is the worst for this. I usually keep a close check but when they draw at a non-standard time of the month and you talked with a live person about wanting to cancel, then it gets tricky. It took ten minutes of me saying no multiple times before I got official notification of the cancellation which I only demanded because I had been paying for 6 months of service I thought I had cancelled.

We have a handful of subscriptions so do try to monitor, but I feel this is a big part of their business model.

[Like2Plan]

I guess there are a few of us who use a spreadsheet to track subscriptions.

I really don't like the auto renew type subscriptions. If I have an option I don't pick auto renew.

My bane is credit cards. I have some that have a fee. Some I have kept for years because the benefits the card provides outweighs the annual fee. For example, Marriott--one of the benefits is each year I get 1 free night in a cat 5 room. My goal is to use it on a room that costs way more than the annual fee. But, they have changed many of the properties where I have used the certificate in the past to cat 6. So, every year I weigh whether it is worth it or not and whether I should cancel.

[snafu]

Thanks for the 'head's up' on CCs renewal dates. Many of the newer cards waived fees for the 1st year to entice acceptance. I've noted card's expiry dates on cell's calendar and called on one that's due to renew next month. I wasn't going to renew until she said the fee would be waived for year II as I'd met their card 'standard.' I'm delighted, cash back on furniture purchase was worth the application hassle.

[terri77]

I hate those automatic renewals & I have never agreed to one implicitly. They are always a default opt-in.