A subscription audit in twenty minutes
Published
Nobody decides to pay for six streaming services, two cloud storage plans and a gym they visited in March. It happens one small charge at a time, each of them too modest to question.
An audit takes about twenty minutes and does not need to be painful.
1. List everything that repeats
Go through your expenses and pick out anything that comes back every month or every year. If you capture your spending as you go, this is mostly done for you: recurring expenses show up on their own, with what you pay and how often.
2. Sort them into three piles
- Used this month, would miss it. Keep.
- Used sometimes. Decide: is it worth the price, or only worth it in the months you use it?
- Forgot it existed. Cancel today, while you are looking at it.
3. Check the price
Subscriptions rarely announce a price rise. They just charge more. Compare what you pay now with what you paid a year ago; the difference alone sometimes settles the question for a service you were on the fence about.
4. Mind the annual ones
Yearly renewals are where most of the money hides, because you see them once and forget them for eleven months. Put the renewal date in your calendar a week ahead so that the decision is yours, not the card's.
5. Do it again
Twice a year is plenty. Put it next to a date you already remember, the start of a season or the day you change the clocks, and it will happen.