Welcome to Saving Money with Andrew!
A large chunk of our monthly budget goes to subscription-based services, including phone, internet, streaming, meal plans and newspapers. I try to optimize these services as much as possible, and reviewing and minimizing recurring charges is one of my favorite tips.
This week, our annual promotional offer for the NYTimes expired. The regular NYT annual rate is $17/month, or $204/year. But, for the first year, the rate is just $4/month, or $48/year. Unfortunately, if you do nothing, the promotional rate expires and you switch to an automatic charge of $17/month. This is not good.
The New York Times generated $227 million in digital subscription revenue from 7.6 million digital subscribers (on average) in the first 3 months of 2022, earning about $10/month per digital subscriber. A lot of people were on a first-year promotion, but many are paying the $17/month price. Your goal should be to always be at $4/month.
Doing this is simple, and we have renewed our $4/month promo for several years. All you need to do is set an annual reminder (I use Todoist, more discussion of my reminder system here) for a week or two before your promotion expires. Then, simply follow these steps:
Go to Customer Care and click on “Chat with us”
Explain to the representative that you’d like to extend your promotion. I simply said that I noticed our $4/month promo rate was expiring on [date], that we didn’t feel comfortable paying $17/month and would like to cancel unless that rate could be extended.
You may have to chat with more than one person, as the first may transfer you to another rep.
The representative will then offer you another year at the $4/month promo rate.
This process took me 11 minutes, and saved us over $150 this year. If you’re one of the other ~8 million subscribers to the NYT, this might benefit you! And if you’re put off by the cost of the NYT, consider subscribing with the $4/month promo offer and using this tip each year.
And now, Andrew’s pick(s) of the week:
Inflation has been fast and furious, reaching another high (9.1%!) last month. Some people are responding by learning to…use all the parts of a chicken??
Great news for Americans with medical debt that had been paid but was still impacting their credit score—Medical Debt Is Being Wiped Off Credit Reports. What That Means for You
Also:
World’s Fastest Sprinters to Schlubs on the Street: No, I Don’t Want to Race
A heartwarming story, and a great money-saving idea (for some people)! One roommate is 85, the other is 27. Such arrangements are growing.
I hope this has been helpful. If you liked it, please share it on social media! Also, please send me your feedback, requests, and success stories.
This was so easy to do thanks to your instructions!