June 4th, 2008
50 TIPS TO HELP FAMILIES SAVE
1. Pool together with families to purchase a side of beef or lamb or buy the whole side yourself, cut into portions and freeze.
2. If charged a credit card “over the limit” fee, banks will often reverse it when asked.
3. Extensions on phone, gas and electricity bills are often available on request.
4. Know when your credit card’s interest-free period cuts off and aim to pay bills after that date, giving you an interest-free month to pay it back.
If the interest-free date is the 15th of each month, make purchases or pay bills using your credit card on the 16th or close to it so you have nearly a whole month to pay it back without accumulating interest.
5. Don’t buy new footy boots for the kids. Clubs will give away secondhand boots or sell them cheaply. Re-pay the favour by putting your old ones in there.
6. Ask the bank to lower your credit card’s interest rate. They will often oblige.
7. Put dinner leftovers into takeaway containers and freeze or have for the next day’s lunch.
8. Pay bills on time, especially from any company likely to charge you a late fee.
9. Keep tuckshop as a treat for the kids and not a fall-back position for lunches.
10. Buy wine in bulk, just don’t drink it all at once.
11. Buying two-for-one deals in supermarkets can really stretch food supplies. Muffins, bread, crumpets and even scones can be purchased in quantity and frozen. They can be individually wrapped and frozen so they can easily be grabbed from the freezer for lunches and snacks.
12. Spending time in the kitchen on a Sunday afternoon making up muffins or patty cakes gives you some yummy, fresh goodies to take to work or pack for the kid’s lunches.
13. Start a bidding war. Get a quote from one store for a product you want to buy and take it to another store to see if they can beat the price. This is a method which can go on indefinitely until you have reached their bottom line, which is surprisingly lower than you realise.
14. For travel, Student Flights and STA are cheaper than most travel agents and are not only available for students. Being located in Brisbane, access to them can present some problems but one way around that is to get a quote from their website and take it to an agent up here such as Flight Centre, which often agrees to beat any competitor’s prices.
15. Vodafone prepaid phone cards at Woolworths come with a 10% discount and forspending $44, you can receive $300 credit a month.
16. Visit a large fruit and vegetable shop like Erbacher’s at Didillibah or the Big Pineapple Farmer’s Market at Woombye for the weekly fruit and veg shop. The produce is local and often sold in bulk, which is cheaper.
17. Avoid shopping sprees before long weekends and special occasions. There is inevitably a sale afterwards to get rid of excess stock. This is especially true for events like Easter and Mother’s Day, when stores will sell the same stock at heavily discounted prices the day after.
18. Major stores seem to have sales at the drop of a hat so if you can be patient, don’t buy clothing, perfume or even whitegoods at full price as a sale is often just around the corner.
19. If you are paying for health insurance, a bit of planning where possible can help you reap the most benefit. Yearly limits can be handled by, for example, buying glasses in the last half of the year followed by purchasing contact lenses at the start of the following year. Keep a copy of the benefits handy in your bag so you know exactly what you can claim.
20. Major supermarkets will often heavily discount the price of meat not long before closing time, so loiter. It is often worth the time. This is also frequently the case early on a Monday morning.
21. Check the back of your shopping docket. There are vouchers on the back of these for everything from carpet cleaning to free games of indoor bowls.
22. Buy petrol at the bottom of the pricing cycle on a Tuesday. Some service station prices don’t jump until Wednesday but to be sure, fill up the day before. Weekends are always going to be more expensive when it comes to putting petrol in the tank.
23. Turn everything off at the powerpoint to save on the electricity bill.
24. Fill the washing machine up, say, twice a week instead of doing smaller loads four or five times a week. You will save on electricity, water and washing powder.
25. Don’t underestimate how much can be saved on everything from pyjamas to swimwear when purchased on sale.
26. Put an extra jumper on instead of turning on the heater.
27. Charity stores like the Salvation Army and St Vincent de Paul carry some great clothes, including brand names, at very cheap prices and the money comes back to a good cause.
28. If you shop late of an afternoon you can often get items such as bread marked down.
29. Start shopping early for Christmas presents or, when you see something you like on special, lay-by it. Lay-by stores will often extend the time a little if asked.
30. To avoid paying large sums out in one go, anyone on a Centrelink benefit can have small fortnightly payments taken straight out of their pension for electricity, gas and phone.
31. Use an “envelope” system and allocate a percentage of your income into each envelope with one envelope covering the cost of electricity, another one phone bills, another for gas. Especially effective for those yearly bills including car registration and insurance.
32. Buy clothes for the kids that are a size too big. They will grow into it very quickly. This is especially important at the change of seasons.
33. Shop once a fortnight instead of weekly. You will be amazed at how much you save.
34. Keep receipts so you can exchange or return goods when necessary instead of having to replace it at your own cost.
35. Buying fruit and vegies at your local markets on a Saturday or Sunday is a brilliant way to save money and ensure there is plenty of fresh, healthy food in the house. And the closer to closing time, the cheaper the food will be.
36. Challenge members of your family to come up with ideas for a free family day out like climbing Mount Coolum or a family game of cricket on the beach. It gets you out of the house and lets you spend time together inexpensively.
37. Avoid takeaway food. If you must have pizza, get in the car or go for a walk and pick it up rather than paying extra for delivery.
38. Instead of hitting the video shop on a weekly basis, organise DVD and video swap nights with friends and relatives. Once you have exhausted each of their collections, make sure you return DVDs and videos back to your local store by the due date. Late fees add up quickly and are often more than the original hire price.
39. Before paying for music and sports lesson privately, check out programs offered by your local school. Often they will have classes at heavily subsidised rates.
40. Cash advances on credit cards start accumulating interest immediately, so this is best avoided wherever possible.
41. Buy in bulk wherever possible. Larger packets of everything from toilet paper to nappies, washing powder, cold meats and even washing detergent can be stored for long periods of time and buying in bulk is almost always cheaper.
42. Some shops, including hairdressers, will charge more on a Sunday than any other day because they have to pay staff penalty rates so find out when the prices are different and take advantage of cheaper days.
43. Those bargain racks in places like K-Mart and Target are called that for good reasons. There are some amazing clothes bargains to be found if you take the time. The same goes for those shopping trolleys in supermarkets marked “discounted”.
44. Don’t underestimate the bargains to be found at garage sales and second-hand stores. But it’s also a good idea to give yourself a budget when going to a garage sale so you don’t spend any savings you make on stuff you don’t need and won’t want as soon as you get it home.
45. Try to pay cash for items whenever possible. This will help you avoid credit card interest and eftpos charges.
46. Plan a weekly menu and shop for it. This will mean You are less likely to make impulse food buys and you will be less likely to throw food out because no meal has been planned around using it.
47. If you are able to motivate yourself, give up the expensive gym membership and opt instead for your own exercise from riding a bike, going for a walk or run, or swimming whenever you can.
48. Instead of buying your lunch, take a packed lunch from home. You will be amazed at how much money you will save.
49. When it comes to birthdays and other major celebrations, instead of buying a present by yourself, ask others to chip in. It will increase the pool of money and cost you all less.
50. Buy fruit and vegetables which are in season and plan your meals around them.
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Every fall, several dozen employees from Consumers Union spend two evenings learning how to be safer on the roads. This is an organization that already focuses on safety (we’re supposed to cover hot beverages as we carry them from the cafeteria to our offices in case we bump into someone on the way), so it’s not surprising the driver-safety course fills to capacity every year.