Saving Money Takes Time and Sometimes a Kick in the Rear

Hi there. Apologies for the text heavy and picture light post.

In the great big scheme of frugal living it is often the small and mundane things that make a difference. I make it a point to call my water company every year when they set the sewer rates because the average three month period they use to calculate it is not the three month period that I use the least water. This only saves me around $7 a month but that adds up to $84 a year.  In this spirit of frugality I had decided to cut the cable cord a few months ago but did not follow through until today.  The Roku I got for Christmas, thanks Mom, and the digital antennae are hooked up and the cable box will be given back to the provider today. When I called my current provider, I will call them company A, the retention agent was doing his job by asking me if I was sure that I could stand living without CNN and the sports channels.  When I informed him, after the fourth or fifth question/warning about the dire consequences of getting through life on less than 3000 channels, that I just wanted to cut the cord he informed me that I would only be saving $40 a month. This irritated me because the prices reflected in my most current bill made it seem that I would be saving more than $60.  I responded by asking if that meant that I should check with the competition to see if I could get a better price and he HUNG UP on me. No confirmation of my cable service ending, no telling me how long I had to give the cable box back, he just hung up.  So I called back and kept hitting 0 to talk to a person without selecting the reason why, I complained that the retention agent had hung up on me and was given a minimal apology.  I then proceeded to ask about the pricing and was told that the reason individual prices would go up was because I was losing my hidden bundle discount. It turns out that the pricing on my bill contained hidden discounts that were not reflected in the bundle discount that was shown. Grrrrr, aren't bills supposed to reflect costs accurately?

At this point in the conversation with Company A I wanted them all to step on these barefoot.

Oh well, at this point I was well and truly pissed off so I went online to check out the competition's prices.  As I was online I called the competition, provider B, to verify that I could keep my phone number if I switched services.  I was told that yes I could do this so I asked if the internet only offer of a gift card was available if I completed my order over the phone and was told that yes it was.  As the agent is telling me about the upfront costs she quoted a shipping price that was free on my computer screen.  When I asked if that offer was available on the phone she said that it was. Eventually I agreed to a one year contract with company B with a 30 day option to cancel for any reason.

Be like the cat, look in as many places as possible for a good deal. (He was actually looking for ranch dressing)

In the long run, by taking the time to research pricing and asking a lot of questions I will be saving close to $100 a month by cutting cable and switching providers. It took some time, energy, and the spark of righteous indignation to get me moving on this but I feel fairly positive about the outcome.  I am not, however, going to cancel my existing service until the day the new service begins because I don't trust provider A to not screw it up accidentally/on purpose. My only regret is that I didn't do this sooner.

Once money saving has been accomplished continue to be like the cat and take a load off. (Preferably not in the ironing basket full of clean clothes like this cat did)

If you made it this far thanks for reading my vent and take a look at your bills, is there a way to save money there?

See you soon.