No idea? Nor do I. That's probably why £25 billion is wasted every year in the UK on subscriptions we don't use, according to Natwest.
The world has changed in so many ways over the last 2 years as we have all been forced to adapt our behaviour and consume more products and services online. With this change many businesses have also changed their business model to subscriptions whereby you pay for products on a monthly basis, often over a 12 or 24 month contract but increasingly on also on a rolling monthly basis.
There are advantages to this for both the business and often the consumers, so to be clear this article isn’t setting out to say “subscriptions are bad” rather to highlight some of the challenges we all face in managing an ever-increasing number.
I don’t know about you, but I have lost track of the number of services I subscribe too – Sky, Netflix, O2, Amazon prime, YouTube music and Spotify to name a few but it wasn’t until I got a reminder for our annual National Trust payment, the same day as I saw an email from Harry Razors telling me I could change my delivery date, that I thought about taking a closer look at what we are paying for.
Over dinner I asked my wife and son how many subscription products they thought we had – once I qualified what I meant (products we have a regular monthly or yearly payment for) they guessed somewhere between 10 and 15. When I added them all up and showed them, the number was 27 and included the aforementioned National Trust, Harrys Razors, Peloton, plus the TV, music streaming, gym membership, utility bills, insurance products and random ones like BT internet email, the Nest door bell and a costa coffee plan!
So what's the problem you might ask? Well, like I say, if you willingly subscribed to these services, you use them all and they provide good value then there may be no problem at all. But what if you are locked into a contract you didn’t realise you were signing up for when you took a free trial, or your price has been increased without you being properly notified, or the fact there may be better value out there for new customers but you have been overlooked as an existing customer or you simply forget you had a service that you no longer use? How often to you see great sign up promotions for new customers that aren't available to existing customers – a loyalty penalty some might say! All of these are real issues many consumers face and contribute the the £25bn UK consumers spend on services they no longer use or need (according to Nat West).
Well fear not, help is at hand…..little birdie is an amazing app packed with great features that will do the hard work for you. Once you have downloaded and registered (which takes less than 5 mins) it will keep track of all your subscriptions, let you know when payments are due, show you when there may be a better value alternative and even provide help and advice with how to cancel. You won’t ever forget to cancel a free trial again or find that you have been rolled into a new contract or missed out on better value. And with super simple reminder functionality you can also set reminders for things like MOTs or car tax or anything that you might forget!
Its free to download and free to use so register your interest / download the app here and start saving!
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