Angel's Financial Overhaul Tips

Hi Everyone

I thought it would be a timely reminder to do a few checks on our household budget items, firstly because those of us with Private Health Insurance have just had the goalposts changed. I know Scott Pape, The Barefoot Investor, has a great book on this, and please refer to your own resources. This is a quick call to do your update.

Health Insurance
This week the Health Funds brought in new levels of insurance so we need to jump online and check what they have done to our existing cover. Have they put us into a level that is no longer suitable for our needs or usage patterns?

Electricity Accounts
Is your account the best one for your household usage? Go online to your provider and do an update. Give them a phone call to answer any questions, and go from there. When I did this last year, there was a really good comparison website linked.

Superannuation
A few years ago I received a letter from my fund that was quite vague and I didn't recognise the importance of following it up. It turned out that they were going to alter the default settings to Income Protection Insurance and clients would have to manually opt out if it was not appropriate to their profession. I believe the Ombudsman has since told them what to do with this, but just in case......

Go online and check what settings your various insurances, if you have them in your account, have been set. I discovered that in my fund, they automatically set everyone to the most expensive level, like for construction workers, and I was able to reduce my premium significantly. Too bad I only looked into this about $2000 later. Please dont waste money on insurance you do not need.

 

This is timely with the Federal Budget being released. I would add:

Phone
My parents had a suite of plans for phones and data costing over $300 per month. My mobile phone plan costs $15 per month with all the data I need.

Internet
There are high speed NBN plans with unlimited data for $60 per month. If you use less data or are happy with a lower speed you should be paying less

 

@Angel,
Agree with you, great thread. I read both books by Barefoot Investor and he mentioned there that only 10% of us here in OZ check our bills to see if we can get a better deal (very poor statistic in deed).

So we made a deal with our adult kids, if they save us on bills we will match 100% the funds to them (why pay the provider.... instead pay family right?).

Our youngest found a great deal with Optus for many mobiles (they had a special offer till end of March) and the saving was 52%. On Telstra another saving of around $70/month.

Gas/electricity I did sometime ago...
Insurances...some

You are right there are many ways to save, especially on your bills, which many don't realize, and sometimes it is just enough to ask.

I say a dollar saved is dollar earned....!
Many times I just compare to coffees, I say you know how many coffees I can buy for that....
I wish more members read your thread..

You see I am a student of what I read, I take out at least one thing to do what I read to make my life, our family life, better....

 

Good reminder.

We find that not renewing car insurance policies but taking out new ones with the same provider is often cheaper. We also compare around but to take advantage of a multi policy discount we often stay with the same provider if all is well with the new quote rather than renewal.

If you are a family with teenage kids who have phones then Aldi has a family pack which is 4 sims and shared allowances that you can control Share more spend less with the ALDImobile Family Pack . Even a non traditional family blend - ie I could share this between myself, my 2 parents and a teenager - doesn't really matter - you could be 4 mates who split the bill.

 

My adult kids live in a four-bedroom townhouse in a large complex at Strathpine. It is made up of NRAS properties and single parents and well you get the idea. The complex management has a bulk deal with an electricity provider and a wifi provider (sorry I dont know which ones). The residents can choose to use these providers and the plans are amazing.

 

Has anyone utilised the gov’s pre-election advertising and phoned their energy provider and asked for a better deal? How did it go?

 

The key is “If you never ask you’ll never get”.
I just posted a very similar thread, where I just saved $750 per annum by simply calling my health care provider and bank.
Got a .10bps discount and 1 months free Insurance valued at $275. Rinse and repeat every year.

But it works for everything, but the key is loyalty. If you stick to a provider then Most will work extra hard to retain your business.

I had a Woolworth’s credit card where I was silly and missed payments about 3 times over 5 years and was looking at around $400 interest each time. Every time I called them and said it was a simple mistake. First two times removed the interest no worries, 3rd time said no. I replied back thanks and I’ll be canceling my card. Funnily enough got a call less than 1 hour later with a sorry and they cleared it.

Literally just yesterday my wife and I went over our shared mobile data (she has been home sick and watching a lot of Netflix, we don’t have home internet yet so need to use 4G). Anyways got an auto text that they added 1GB for $10. I knew we needed more so quickly jumped on Telstra online chat and after a few back and forths they wiped the $10 and gave me 5GB for free.

Point is it’s amazing how easy it is to save money if all you do is ask! I always laugh how people are “too busy to do that”. The irony is they are too busy working for what $40 an hour?
I have literally saved tens of thousands over my lifetime just by asking for more. Probably spent less than 10 hours doing that. $1,000 an hour tax free works for me