2018 Cash Back Rewards Wrap Up, Miscellaneous Stuff, and Foreshadowing

I know I've been away for a bit and I missed posting a net worth update for December. My only excuse is it was the holidays and we went on a road trip (which I did manage to blog about). Today, I'm going to write about a couple of little things that are too small for individual blogs posts. Look at this as the blog equivalent of petit fours, or perhaps a few amuse-bouches, if you will.

Cash Back Rewards For 2018

In October, I posted my cash back rewards for the year to date - $1,026.66. At the time, there were three months left in the year, so I went back to see what my year-end number turned out to be.

I added almost another $400 exactly to finish the year with $1,425.63 in cash back rewards. That's over fourteen hundred dollars that credit card companies gave me simply for using their cards. To put that in perspective, that's like getting one free car payment on my Tesla.

Card Card Interest Charges For 2018

How much did that money cost me or, in other words, how much credit card interest did I pay in 2018?

I'd like to say zero, but I actually paid $2.14 in interest. This was only because I entered a date incorrectly on my bill pay app and missed a due date by a couple of days one month. Missing a perfect record of no interest charges pissed me off. At least I wasn't also hit with a late fee.

Stock Market Volatility

Although I was not able to post a December net worth post, I have been following my net worth. As most people know, the stock market has been incredibly volatile since last September. Take a look at how that has translated to the value of my brokerage accounts:

Click to embiggen

That chart is just my brokerage accounts, not my total net worth and the first big drop in September was when I withdrew money to buy my Tesla. But look at the fluctuations after that, especially compared to before. Crazy! It's even crazier when you realize I add money to these accounts every week, yet I still saw some serious declines. So yes.. You really need to take a long term view when investing in the stock market.

What's Coming Up?

There is a good chance I will have some exciting news in February. Let me just say that it started with a trip to the mall. Stay tuned!

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Don't Leave Money On The Table: My Credit Card Cashback Rewards Year To Date (Sep. 2018)

This week, I'm going to take a short break from all the Tesla posts and get back to some personal finance topics. My post on my first week of Tesla ownership will be next week, I promise!

I got an email from my Chase Freedom credit card a week ago showing me how much I've earned in cash back bonuses so far this year.

That's a pretty big chunk of change! It's higher than I would have guessed.

But this was only for one of my credit cards. I also have a Discover card that earns cash back and partway through the year, my wife switched to the Citi Double Cash card, which gives you 1% back on charges and 1% back on payments. My wife also has a Discover card as well, so we earn cash back there. Basically, every credit card we own gives us cash back.

We charge just about everything we purchase and pay off our balances in full each month (each week, actually). Because we never carry a balance, we are never charged interest. This means all the cash back we earn goes straight into our pocket. It's like getting free money.

I was curious to see how much free money we earned over all of our credit cards so far this year. Luckily, I track all my transactions on a phone app, so it was a simple matter to get this information.

Wow! $1,025.66! That's a lot of free money! (And there's still three more months in the year!)

This isn't phantom savings either. I don't take this money and go spend it all on hookers and blow frivolous items. Each month, as soon as the cash back is awarded, I immediately apply it to my credit card balance. That means it directly reduces the cost of my day-to-day monthly expenses.

The trick to maximizing cash back is to pay attention to the details of your cash back program. For example, both my Chase Freedom card and our Discover cards have a bonus category each quarter where you earn 5% cash back instead of the normal 1% or 2%.

For July, August, and September, the bonus category for Discover was restaurants. So anytime we went to a restaurant (even fast food), I made sure to use my Discover card. For October, November, and December, the bonus category changes to Amazon.com. So on October 1, I'm going to change my default credit card on Amazon to be my Discover card. I'll probably also do most of my holiday shopping on Amazon to earn more. (I'm an Amazon Prime member, so shipping doesn't cost me any extra.)

I keep a note in my wallet listing the bonus categories for each card, so I can make sure I use the right card in the right situation.

It's really nice when you can put big expenses on a cash back card. Back in August, I paid my $2,500 Tesla deposit with my Chase Freedom card. The $4,000 worth of electrical work I had done for installing the wall charger and new electrical panel? On the credit card.

Of course, the important part is being able to pay off your credit card bill in full each month. If you can't do that, you'll end up losing money. But if you are careful with budgeting and are able to consistently pay off your monthly bill, you can earn some serious coin for buying stuff you needed anyway. So take full advantage of your cash back cards and don't leave money on the table!

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Don't Leave Money On The Table: Reconcile Your Statements!

Balancing your checkbook is one of the most boring things a person can do.  It's the brushing your teeth of the finance world. You know you should do it but it's kinda a pain in the butt and if you skip it once in a while, is it really going to matter?

And it's not just bank statements that need to be balanced, or at the very least, reviewed. Any statement you get that involves money should be reviewed. That means credit card statements, brokerage statements, phone bills, utility bills, etc.

Now, you don't have to go over everything with a fine-toothed comb. In many instances, you just need to look for things that seem anomalous, unexpected.

For example, I rarely look at my brokerage statements in great detail. I'm not an active trader, so there usually isn't much activity to review. I do always look for one thing - fees. I shouldn't be incurring any fees in my accounts, and I always check to make sure that is still the case. But it's always possible I missed a notification of some change and could start incurring fees, so I want to watch out for that.

My credit card statements and bank statements, are another matter. With those, I do verify every single item. During the month, I enter all my charges and deposits in a phone app called Expense IQ (formerly Easy Money). When my statement comes, I go through each line, marking off each one in the app. When I'm done, my closing balance in the app should match the closing balance on my statement.

I will admit, this can be a chore. Ninety-five percent of the time, everything matches up. But, there are times where I have found charges I forgot to enter in the app.

I also sometimes find errors in my statement - like the one today that got me writing this post. I was reconciling my credit card statement against the entries in my app and found an error: I was double-charged at a fast food restaurant a week ago.

I remember exactly when it happened. I was paying through the restaurant's phone app. To do this, my phone displays a QR code that I hold up to a scanner at the register. The scanner has a green light that comes on when it has successfully scanned my code and charged my credit card.

(Not my hand or my phone.)

On this particular day, I went through that process and got the green light, but the cashier said it didn't go through. I said "But I got the green light." He said "Yes, but I have to hit something on my screen first." Hmm. Whatever. So we did it again and I got the green light again.

Sure enough, my statement came and I saw I was charged twice on that day. A quick call to my credit card company had the extra charge removed, but if I wasn't looking at each transaction, I would have missed this.

It's tempting to think that, with automated payments or electronic billing, things can't go wrong, but they do. It's your money, so watch over it and don't leave money on the table. I can guarantee you that the fast food restaurant would not have made any attempt to refund that money to me!

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When Stocks Keep Giving After You Have Sold Them

Over a year ago, I wrote this piece about how to go paperless. As a small aside in the post, I said:

(I have been involved in some class action lawsuits regarding stock purchases made years ago, so I felt I should keep all my old brokerage statements.) 

Class action lawsuits against companies are somewhat controversial. On the one hand, they do serve a valid purpose of holding companies accountable when they wrong a large number of people for damages that would be too small for any one individual to sue for. On the other hand, there are a lot of questionable lawyers that abuse the process and use class action suits as a way to generate income for their law firms.

No matter your position on them, they are here to stay and when one comes my way, I will take advantage of it.

Today, I reaped the benefits of my paperless lifestyle. I received notification of a class action lawsuit against THQ (who was actually an old employer of mine). To receive a claim from the lawsuit, you need to submit proof that you bought or sold THQ stock within a certain time period. That proof needed to be in the form of brokerage statements.

If I did not have electronic records, I wouldn't even bother tracking this information down. The time frame in question was between May, 2011 and February, 2012. I've got a lot of brokerage accounts. It probably would take me a couple of hours to go through paper copies looking for transactions involving THQ stock.

eStatements to the rescue!

Because I have gone paperless, all my statements are stored in .PDF files. Furthermore, Windows can read .PDF files and can index the contents. So I just navigated to my brokerage statements folder on my computer, typed "THQ" in the Search bar, and bam! I got a list of all my statements that contained THQ. Because I use a naming convention based on the date, I was able to easily find the three brokerage statements I needed for the class action suit.

I Was Just Paid $600 An Hour!

I printed them out, filled out the claim form, and mailed it in. Total time spent: about 30 minutes. Based on the claim form instructions, I should receive about $301 from the lawsuit. Not bad! And it's even better when you realize that I just made more money from stocks I sold over 5 years ago!

If you want to go all out with the class action lawsuits, you can visit www.classactionrebates.com for a list of hundreds of class actions lawsuits you might be a party to.

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Don't Leave Money On The Table: Changing Jobs With A Medical FSA = Free Money

Medical flexible spending accounts (FSAs) offer you a way to pay for certain medical expenses using pre-tax dollars. At the beginning of the year, you tell your employer how much money to put into this account for the year and, each paycheck, a portion of your pay is diverted into the account. The amount is divided equally over the course of the year. You get that money back by submitting receipts for covered medical expenses to the plan administrator, who then disburses the money from the account to you.

These accounts are use-it-or-lose-it accounts, meaning if you don't submit enough qualifying expenses during the year to use all your money, you lose whatever is left. (Recent changes allow your employer to offer you the opportunity to roll some funds over into the following year, but this is something your employer has to opt-in to, so check your plan details to see if this option is available to you.)

The IRS states these plans have to operate under Uniform Coverage Rules (PDF) for cafeteria plans. This means the entire amount of your yearly contribution must be made available immediately at the start of the year.

So if you elect to contribute $2,500 for the year, you can submit a qualifying medical claim for $2,500 in January and get the entire amount paid to you, even though you have not yet contributed that amount to the plan. (Remember, your contribution is spread out over all your paychecks for the year. So if you get paid twice a month, or 24 times a year, each paycheck you deposit $104.17 to the account.)

As I mentioned before, this is a use-it-or-lose-it account. If it gets to be December 31 and you have not spent $2,500 in qualifying medical claims throughout the year, you lose whatever excess funds are in the account. But...

What happens if you change jobs during the year?

Free Money Happens!

Because the plan must operate under Uniform Coverage Rules, employees have a way to get some free money though a loophole.

Suppose you elect to contribute $2,500 to your FSA account. In January, you go crazy and go to a bunch of doctors and buy all kinds of covered items. You manage to incur $2,500 in medical costs during the month. You submit the receipts and the plan pays you $2,500. On February 1, you change jobs.

Because you were only at your old job for one month, you only contributed 1/12 of $2,500 to the account. But they already paid you the full $2,500. Here's the loophole:

Your employer cannot recoup that money from you.

You just got $2,292 in free medical care! (That's $2,500 minus the 1/12 of $2,500 you paid in January.) This is the positive flip side of the use-it-or-lose it nature of the plan.

To make the deal sweeter, when you start at your new employer, you can start another medical FSA for the maximum amount and continue to submit expenses against that.

The Fine Print

There is one rule you need to be careful of: expenses have to be incurred while you are still covered under your old plan. So, in our example, if you quit your job on January 31st, the plan will only pay for medical costs incurred on January 31 or earlier. Depending on the plan, you may also have to submit receipts for reimbursement prior to your final day of employment.

This just takes a little planning. If you know you will be changing jobs, go on a spending spree to use up the full amount you elected to put away in your FSA. It can be hard to use up the extra funds solely from visits to the doctor (most elective surgeries do not qualify for reimbursement). However, look at the list of over the counter products that DO qualify:

• Bandages
• Blood pressure monitors
• Cough medicine
• Crutches
• Alcohol swabs
• Condoms
• Eyeglasses
• Non-cosmetic dental work
• Saline nose sprays
• First Aid kits
• Reading glasses
• Sunscreen
• Lip balm with sunscreen

Those are just a few. A more detailed list can be found here. Your FSA plan administrator probably also has a list of all covered items. Most drug stores with pharmacies note on the receipt which purchases are eligible for FSA reimbursement.

So if you are planning on changing jobs, go a medical spending spree and use up all of your FSA funds, even those that haven't been deducted from your paycheck yet. And don't leave money on the table!

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Two Reasons Why I Love Living With A Budget

In the past two weeks, I've had to have new spark plugs installed in my car and my wife decided we needed to get a couple oriental rugs cleaned before the holidays roll around. In short, two major expenses hit us within two weeks of each other.

Spark Plugs Ain't Easy To Find Anymore

I thought about changing the spark plugs myself. Remember when you could open the hood of your car and see something like this:

They don't make them like this anymore

Those spark plugs would sit right on top of the engine block, easily accessible at the end of those blue cables. Boy, things sure have changed! While investigating how to change the spark plugs on my car, I found this video and saw exactly how much of the engine compartment I'd have to take apart to do it today. That's waaaaaay outside my comfort zone. Additionally, I don't even have all the tools needed to do the job. So off to the dealer I went for this work. Total cost - about $300. (Reason #2,343,241 to get a Tesla - no spark plugs!)

Rugs Aren't Cheap Either

Getting the rugs cleaned was actually even pricier. I have a home warranty and the policy covers carpet cleaning. Unfortunately, it only covers wall to wall carpeting, not area rugs. However, they gave me the name of the contractor they use and I called them for a quote.

One rug measures 8 feet by 11 feet and the other is 6 feet by 9 feet. The difference in prices between the two were substantial: $240 for the big one ($2.72/square foot) and $162 for the smaller ($3.00/square foot).

(At this point, I briefly considered just renting a carpet cleaning unit and cleaning them myself, but given that one of the rugs cost over $2,000, I opted to stick with professionals for cleaning.)

When talking to the contractor, he told me that his company actually does the area rug cleaning for most of the other rug cleaners in the vicinity. I just chalked this up to a sales pitch, but I called another company for a quote and was given exactly the same prices, so maybe he was telling me the truth. The second company also charged extra to come to my house to pick up the rugs. The first company included that in their price.

Because I don't like to leave money on the table, I called the first contractor back and asked if, because I was referred to them from my home warranty company, they could give me some sort of discount. I figured it was a long shot, but it never hurts to ask. To my surprise, the guy said yes and gave me a quote of $350 for both rugs, a $52 discount. He said he'd like to give me a bigger discount, but since the plant where they clean the rugs is in Tucson, about a 1.5 hour drive south of me, he couldn't really go any lower. I agreed to the price and they were able to get a truck out that day to pick them up.

Budgets Save The Day And My Piece Of Mind

So in a span of two weeks, I had to lay out $650 for expenses - and right before the big holiday shopping season starts. In the pre-budget days, that would have thrown my finances into a tailspin for at least two months, probably longer.

In these days of budgeted living, I didn't blink an eye. Two line items in my budget are Car Maintenance and Home Maintenance. I had money in both of those accounts to cover these bills. No stress. No pain. I charged both items to my credit card to earn the cash back reward (effectively giving myself another 1% discount) and transferred the money from my bank account to the credit card to pay for them before I accrued any interest charges. Easy peasy.

This, more than anything else, proves to me the value of budgeting! Have any of you had a similar experience?

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Making The Most Of Your Las Vegas Budget

My wife and I took a trip to Las Vegas recently and I thought I’d write about the expenses involved and how we managed to reduce those by using a casino's player's club card.  I’ve written before about how important these are when it comes to getting comps while gambling. Hopefully, this will provide some hard evidence as to just how much you can save.

I'm Not Referring To Gambling Money

First, let me say that I have two budgets when I go to Las Vegas – a gambling budget and an expense budget. The gambling budget is solely used for gambling. The expense budget includes all non-gambling expenses. "That's cheating!" I hear you scream. "You can't write about Vegas expenses without considering gambling!" Yes, it’s a purely hypothetical distinction. After all, it’s all money coming from our pockets. However, by thinking about it in these terms, I can better track and analyze how much we win or lose gambling and how much we spend on lodging, meals, shows, etc.

Whether we win or lose at gambling is completely random. No amount of planning, praying, blowing on dice, wearing red, or carrying lucky charms will change that fact. Therefore, the gain or loss in our gambling budget is also random. As a result, I view our gambling budget as something I have no control over, short of adding funds to it. If I have no control over it, there's nothing to write about. If we are fortunate enough to end the trip with some of our gambling budget left over (which we usually do), I just roll that money over to the gambling budget for the next trip.

So un-ruffle your feathers, sit your ass down, and let’s look at what this trip cost, excluding gambling.

Details Of Our Trip

We stayed at the Cosmopolitan for three nights in a Terrace One Bedroom room with a view of the Bellagio Fountains. Prices vary by date, but the regular price for this room during our stay was $245 per night. Because we had been there before and are a member of their player’s club, I had received an offer in the mail for 2 free nights plus $130 in free play (credit they give us to gamble with). I also receive one free night per year based on my tier in their players club. By combining these deals, I was able to get all three nights for free. When I made the reservations over the phone, I was told the daily resort fee ($30) was supposedly not included with my free room, but when I checked in I was told it had been waived. Bonus!

A Nicer Room

However, the free nights are for their lowest priced room. My wife and I like to have a bit nicer room, so we upgraded to the one bedroom room with a terrace and a Japanese soaking tub. (Yes, I’m a diva when I go to Vegas.) This is a 2 tier room upgrade and they charge $70/night for that ($35/night each tier). The fountain view I like is usually an additional tier upgrade, but I find I can almost always score that upgrade for “free” with a $20 tip to the person checking me in. Technically, that’s not free, but a one-time $20 cost is much cheaper than another $35/night upgrade fee for 3 nights, so I consider it "free."

The view from our room during the day...

and at night.

 At the Cosmopolitan, besides earning player’s club points by gambling, you can also earn points by spending money at the rate of 5 points per dollar spent. This means it is incredibly important to present your players card whenever you purchase anything in order to maximize your points. I also prefer to charge everything to my room, just to make sure there is another record of my spending in case the wait staff or store clerk forgets to run my player’s card at the time of purchase.(I have one other reason for charging meals to my room, which will become obvious a bit later.)

How We Ate

My wife and I ate at the Wicked Spoon buffet twice – one time for breakfast and one time for dinner. (We usually don't eat lunch in Vegas.) As part of my player’s club benefits, I get a 2-for-1 buffet once a month, which we used for one of the dinners. Total cost for these meals was $85.

We also had dinner one night at the newly opened Beauty And Essex, the Las Vegas version of Chef Chris Santos' New York restaurant of the same name.  That dinner was absolutely amazing! We had 6 tapas-style courses plus three drinks. The food was some of the best I have ever eaten and my wife discovered a new favorite drink called The Woodsman. Total cost for our dinners was $170. Worth every penny.

We ate two meals at The Henry, which is the Cosmo’s 24 hour restaurant. Total cost there was $90. 

We also went to the Wynn one night and tried their newly remodeled Buffet for dinner. That cost $95 for the two of us. (For the record, we felt the remodeled decor and slightly changed menu added up to a big “meh”. It’s not too different from how it was before the remodel.)

Use Your Points Wisely

Of course, when we gambled, we made sure to use our player’s club card, so we earned additional points that way. You have the option of converting your points into either gambling credits or cash to be used to offset any charges you incur. On previous trips, I would convert them to gambling credits, but this trip, I realized the smarter move is to use them to offset spending, which is what I did.

The reason this is a better option is because, when gambling, your expected return is less than 100%. For example, the video poker machines we like to play have a return of about 95.5%, which means the casino keeps about 4.5% of the money you put in, on average. Slot machines probably have a worse payout ratio - you can't tell because, unlike video poker machines, which display their pay tables*, slot machines do not post their payout ratio. But if you use your points to pay for expenses, you’re getting a 100% return on that money. When I checked out, I converted my points to $158 in cash that I applied to my final bill.

* Using this information, plus the known probabilities of certain hands occurring in poker, the machine payout ratio can be calculated.

Extra Credit

And finally, I was able to use a $200 credit card bonus that I earned on a new credit card to offset some of these expenses as well. With this particular card, the bonus can be used only for travel-related expenses such as hotels and transportation. By charging my restaurant bills to my room, they show up on my credit card bill as a hotel charge, not restaurant charges, and hence I can use my bonus on them.

Total Savings: Almost $1,000!

So, let’s look at the overall savings using a player’s club card got me. Costs without discounts:

• 3 nights in 1 bedroom suite with fountain view plus resort fee: $825 
• All meals: $478
• Total: $1,303

•  My cost: $387

 I saved $916 by using my player’s club card!

My Net Cost Was Even Less

My net cost after using my credit card bonus: $187

So our vacation for 4 days and 3 nights for 2 two people cost only $187*! Not bad, considering we ate 4- and 5-star food the whole time. I haven't even mentioned all the free drinks we got while gambling.

* Technically, it cost a little bit more than this because we drove to Las Vegas and had to pay for two tanks for gas to get there and back, but what's $40 between friends, huh?

What About Gambling?

Speaking of gambling, how did that go? Not too bad. We ended up losing $900 total, but this did happen to me:

(Credit - Win) shows I was down to my last 15 credits when I hit this

Am I being disingenuous when I say the trip cost me only $187 and I don’t include my $900 in gambling losses? Possibly. But as I’ve said before, budgeting means separating your money into buckets and my gambling budget is its own bucket.

For this analysis, I am looking only at how my player’s club card saved me money on things I bought and how it can save you money if you use it as we do. Winning or losing at gambling is something outside of our control, so it has to be excluded from any analysis such as this. (Note I have also excluded the $130 in free gambling play I received from the casino, which could be viewed as offsetting some of my loss.)

As an added bonus, we got to meet up with a friend of mine from high school while we were there. (Hi Kevin!)

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Don't Leave Money On The Table: Deduct Mileage On Your Taxes!

I know tax time has passed, but I wanted to pass along one more tax tip that you can use all year long: The government allows you to deduct auto mileage on your federal taxes and many states do as well. If you have driven your car for business and have not received reimbursement for that mileage from your employer, you can deduct the costs from your taxes. That's fairly straightforward. However, most people (outside of those in the delivery industry) typically don't drive their own cars for their employer or, if they do, they usually receive some form of reimbursement for it. But did you know you can deduct mileage for other reasons?

Two More Ways To Deduct Mileage

Tax law also allows you to deduct mileage expenses incurred for medical reasons or charitable purposes. This means you can deduct the mileage for driving to the doctor's office or to the dentist. If you do any driving for charity - perhaps delivering supplies to a homeless shelter - that mileage can be deducted too. Taking a bunch of old clothes to Goodwill? Track your mileage and deduct it!

The Deduction Rate Varies

The amount you can deduct varies depending on what the trip was for - business, medical, or charity. The rates also vary each year to account for the fluctuating price of gasoline and other automotive expenses such as depreciation, maintenance, and licensing. For 2016, the IRS has set the standard mileage deduction rates at:

• 54 cents per mile driven for business
• 19 cents per mile driven for medical
• 14 cents per mile driven for charity

Also, if you have to pay any parking fees or road tolls while driving, those are also deductible.

(I will note those rates are for the standard mileage deduction, which means the IRS comes up with the figure based on estimates for gas prices, vehicle depreciation, oil and tire changes, etc. If you want to, you can deduct the actual expenses, but that requires much more record keeping - such as tracking what percentage of time the vehicle was used for these purposes throughout the year, the actual amount and cost of the gas used, vehicle maintenance, licensing, etc. That is likely not worth the effort. Think of this as akin to the standard versus actual income tax deduction on the tax form - you can track all the details yourself or just use the IRS' best guess.)

What Documentation Is Needed?

To deduct mileage, you need to maintain appropriate documentation. According to the IRS, this means:

• identification of the vehicle used
• documentation of vehicle ownership
• log of miles driven, destination, and purpose of trips
• receipts for any parking fees or tolls paid 

Additionally, to claim this deduction, you have to itemize all your deductions on your taxes - you cannot claim the standard deduction and get this deduction too. (If you have a mortgage, odds are, you are itemizing your deductions anyway.)

Is It Worth It?

The deduction amounts seem rather small and the documentation requirements sound like a pain in the ass. Is it actually worth it to claim this deduction?

The answer, of course, depends on how much you drive and how much you mind keeping records. I will however, tell you that the ubiquity of smart phones has made record keeping as painless as possible. I never leave home without my phone and, as the saying goes, there's an app for that! I use the Mile Bug app.

Mile Bug lets you define start and destination points for your trip, beginning and ending odometer readings from your car, and the reason for your trip. If you want, you can turn on GPS tracking and it will track the miles you drive via GPS. At the end of the year, you can email yourself or your tax preparer a report of all your trips. Here is a sample of my report for this year so far:

click to upsize

I typically end up with about $150 to $200 each year in mileage deductions, which translates to a $40 to $55 tax saving each year (at the 27% tax rate). You might as well take advantage of every deduction you can and don't leave money on the table!

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Update On Previous Posts (Updated)

As part of my Don't Leave Money On The Table series of posts, I wrote almost a year ago about saving asking for a discount. The following month, I wrote a couple of posts about using credit cards wisely and in the second of those posts, I mentioned which reward cards I used. I also wrote about Paribus, a service that monitors your online purchases for price drops and automatically files for refunds for you. Time for an update!

Asking For A Discount

A year has gone by since I asked for (and received) discounts on my internet and satellite TV bills. The discounts I was given have expired, so it was time to call and ask again. I didn't have as quite as much luck with my internet provider as I did twelve months ago. Last year, I was given a $23 per month discount. This year, the company was raising rates in February by $7 per month. I was only able to get a discount of $5 off the current full price, with that price locked in for a year. I mentioned that the price for new customers was lower. I was told that was only valid for new customers. I told them I had been a loyal customer for 10+ years and couldn't believe they would give a better deal to a new customer than to me. No go.

So I took my $5 discount and mentioned that I wasn't happy with it. About two days later, I got a call from someone else at the company saying they understood I wasn't satisfied and what could they do, blah blah blah. I went through the whole explanation again. This time I was offered an additional $2 per month discount. I took it, as it was better than nothing, but I still wasn't happy. But since my total discount now was equal to the new price increase, I considered it a minor victory.

What Happened?

As I mentioned in my original post, asking for discounts doesn't always work. I also made a strategic blunder. This time, when I called I just went through the voice prompts to speak to a customer service representative regarding billing. Last year, I asked to talk to someone about downgrading or cancelling my service. I think not doing so this year was my big mistake. I was asking for something from someone who probably didn't have the ability to give it to me.

Unfortunately, I don't have any realistic alternatives for high speed internet in my area, so I can't threaten to cancel or even price compare with another company. I'm probably stuck until (if / when) Google Fiber comes to town. Still, my phone call saved me $84 per year.

Better Results With Dish Network

The discount I got on my Dish Network bill last year expired this month and I had better luck with them. I called and followed the prompts to speak to someone about changing my service. When I finally got connected to a person, I said I wanted to cancel because the cost was too high. The rep offered to look at what channels I watched and see if there was a cheaper package I might want instead. I told them I was just going to use an over-the-air HD antenna and Netflix, so there was no need to do that. I mentioned that I was receiving a $35 per month discount and that expired, which made the cost too high now. I was offered a $20 per month discount for 10 months, which I accepted. $200 saved!

Reward Credit Cards

I have an American Express Starwood Preferred Guest card. This card earns me SPG points I use for free nights at the hotel chains owned by SPG (although you can also redeem them for frequent flyer miles on just about any airline). This isn't a huge benefit for me, as I usually only redeem them once a year, so I really only used this card at Costco, where they only accept American Express. The card comes with a $95 annual fee.

A couple of big changes happened last year that seriously reduced the value of this card to me. The biggest is that Costco dropped American Express and switched to Visa as its exclusive credit card. This change goes into effect April 1 this year. Since Costco was pretty much the only place I used this card, it was silly for me to pay the $95 annual fee for a card I would rarely use.

So I called up American Express and asked if they would waive the annual fee. I was flat out told no, they do not waive annual fees. I was offered to switch to a card that earned Delta Airline miles and only had a $55 per year fee, but I declined. I immediately asked for my card to be cancelled, which they did.

Doing so, I was struck by their complete lack of concern for losing a customer. The agent I was speaking with didn't seem flustered or bothered at all that I was cancelling my card right then and there. There was no effort to persuade me to stay (beyond the initial new card offer), no attempt to transfer me to a retention specialist, nothing. She just read me some fine print regarding the cancellation and that was it. I got the impression they could care less if I used their card or not. This was really surprising because the few times I have called their customer support in the past, I was always given incredibly helpful service. It seems like American Express is going through an identity crisis these days.

The other factor in my cancelling this card was the merger of Starwood Hotels and Marriott. Like others, I am concerned with how this merger will change the loyalty program. Starwood brand hotels are typically higher end than Marriott and the customer loyalty program has some of the best perks out there. Those will probably disappear soon. But, as I said, I really only stayed in their hotels once or twice a year, so it's not a huge loss.

I attempted to get my card's annual fee waived for a year just so I could see how useful the card would be to me with these changes. I'm not willing to pay $95 to perform that experiment, so I canceled it. As an added bonus, this card had the highest interest rate of all my cards (not that I carry a balance) and was my only card that had an annual fee, so it felt good to toss it.

The Costco switch to Visa is actually better for me, since my Chase Freedom Visa is the card I used almost daily and it will now be accepted at Costco. I earn 1% to 5% cash back with that card and it has no annual fee.

Paribus 

In August last year, I wrote about Paribus, a company that monitors your online purchases from a couple of select websites and automatically files requests for refunds if something you purchased drops in price. When I signed up, Paribus almost immediately found me a $25 refund on a pair of shoes my wife bought. Since then, they haven't found a ton of refunds for me. According to their website, I've made 57 purchases that they have logged and I've received $53 in refunds. Nothing exciting, but nothing to sneeze at either. I suspect my lack of savings is simply due to the type of items I purchase from Amazon. I tend to buy smaller items such as books and various household sundries. I rarely buy big ticket items or fancy electronics, but Paribus still manages to find some rebates for me. For example, I got $2.33 back on a replacement water heater sacrificial anode I bought last month.

That changed yesterday. We've started doing some improvements to our house (after saving up funds through our budget) and one of the projects we are doing is upgrading our TV systems. We're trading out our old rear projection non-HD TV that was 15 years old for a new LED flat screen. I purchased this through Amazon - not only because the price was good, but because I specifically wanted Paribus to monitor the price for me. A week after the purchase, I got notification from Paribus that the price had dropped $200 and they submitted a refund request for me. The next day, I got confirmation from Amazon that I would be getting a $213 credit applied to my credit card! Paribus charges 25% for their service, so I only get a net $160 refund, but I'm not complaining. (Looking back at my previous post, I noticed my first refunds were given in the form of Amazon credits. The last two I have gotten have been actual credits posted to my credit card, which is even nicer than Amazon credit.)

As part of this project, I also purchased a TV wall mount, a DVD player and a new AV receiver. I'm hoping Paribus will find some rebates for those as well. If you are interested in joining Paribus, drop me a note or leave a comment and I can get you a code good for a discount on your first refund.

(UPDATE: 5-23-16) Amazon has changed their price matching policy. From now on, they will only price match televisions. Given this, I have cancelled my Paribus account, as Amazon was the only retailer I used it with. I wonder if the popularity of sites like Paribus and Earny, which tracked Amazon prices for users, was a contributing factor to this change.

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Don't Leave Money On The Table: When Maxing Out Your 401(k) Might Lose You Money

I came across this post on Reddit and it made me aware of a potential situation where you might lose money if you max out your 401(k). I'll recap the post here and try to explain things in a more clear manner (at least to me) than the original author has. The numerical examples I use are the same ones he used.

If your employer offers a 401(k) match AND you are maxing out your 401(k) contributions, you may find your self in a situation where you might miss out on some of that matching money. Now, to be sure, this is going to be a situation few people find themselves in - I personally don't know anyone who is maxing out their 401(k) contribution - but it's worth mentioning in case someday you are able to.

The Problem Scenario

Here's the setup: the IRS has set the maximum amount you can contribute to a 401(k) at $18,000 for 2015. (OK, technically Congress set the limit via law, but the IRS enforces it.) This limit does NOT include any matching funds your employer contributes. Let's assume your employer will match your contributions up to 5% of your salary. The actual amount of the match doesn't matter in this scenario, but we'll go with 5% to have some numbers to work with.

You're a great saver with a high income and have elected to contribute 25% of your $104,000 salary to your 401(k). You get paid biweekly, which means you get 26 paychecks per year. Your pre-tax per paycheck earnings are $4,000, so your 401(k) contribution is $1,000 per paycheck. Each paycheck, your employer matches your contribution up to 5% of your pay, which means they contribute $200 per paycheck (5% of your $4,000 paycheck).

Because the IRS limits you to $18,000 in contributions, after your 18th paycheck, your 401(k) contributions will stop. Once those stop, there is no contribution for your employer to match, so for paychecks 19 through 26, they don't contribute anything. So you've lost $1,600 in matching contributions (8 paychecks times $200 per paycheck).

Now, if your employer is on top of things, they should realize this and at the end of the year, they would make a final "catch-up" contribution to true up. This is because they have agreed to match 5% of your salary and, after their contributions stopped at the 18th paycheck, they have only contributed $3,600, which is less than the 5% of your salary ($5,200) that they promised.

The question then becomes - is your employer on top of things? Will they realize this and actually make the catch up contribution? Will you remember to check to make sure they did? The end of the year is a hectic time with the holidays and vacations and visiting family. It's easy to forget things. Is this one more thing you want to keep track of? I didn't think so.

Here's something else to consider: what if you leave the company after paycheck 23? You'll miss the end of year true up and I'd be willing to bet no one in payroll will remember to perform an end of employment true up just for you. If you forget to bring it to their attention (and you probably will), you'll have lost out on $1,000 in matching contributions (the company match for paychecks 19 through 23).

How To Fix It

There is a relatively easy solution to this problem: adjust your contribution rate so that you don't hit the IRS maximum until your last paycheck of the year.

The maximum contribution is $18,000, which represents about 17.31% of your pay. Change your 401(k) contribution amount from 25% to 17.31%. You'll still be contributing the maximum amount per year, but now, because you are contributing every paycheck, you'll automatically get your employer match each paycheck and won't have to worry about the missing match scenario, either at the end of the year, or if you leave the company.

Most companies only allow contributions to be specified in one percent increments, so you'll have to go with either 17% or 18%. (If you go with 17%, you'll miss maxing out your 401(k) contributions by about $322.)

Another benefit to this method is you can take a little more advantage of dollar cost averaging because your stock or mutual fund purchases will be spread out over 26 pay periods rather than 18.

Although you are doing great by maxing out your 401(k), don't leave money on the table by inadvertently missing some of your employer match!

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Don't Leave Money On The Table: Discounted Gift Cards

Gift cards are some of the most popular gifts given. About two-thirds of all American consumers have purchased a gift card at some point - there's millions of these things floating around. But you'll always find people who don't want to use them for some reason. Either the card is for a store they don't shop at or they forget they have them, or some other reason. As a result, there is over $1 billion dollars loaded on gift cards that goes unclaimed.

Companies have sprung up to help consumers tap into those funds. People can sell their unused gift cards for cash to these companies, who them turn around and sell them to others who want them at a slightly higher price, but still a discount to face value. And larger companies are getting into the act. Costco sells gift cards now for all sorts of venues - you can get a $50 gift card to a restaurant for $40. Instant $10 savings!

But if you know where to look, you can get even bigger savings. A couple of websites that buy and sell gifts cards that I have used are Gift Card Granny and Gift Card Rescue. These sites offer guarrantees that the cards they sell are valid, which is a nice for my piece of mind. Although they sell cards for all types of stores, you'll find the biggest discounts on cards for specialty stores - cards for places like Pier 1 Imports, Williams Sonoma, or Ann Taylor often can be had for discounts in the 20% to 35% range. The smallest discounts are found on cards for places that everyone shops at frequently - places like gas stations and grocery stores. Often, these discounts are only 3% to 5%. In my opinion, that's not even worth it - your savings won't even cover your sales tax.

This is a great option to keep in mind when you are planning a large purchase. For example, a couple of years ago, I found two china cabinets I wanted to buy at Pier 1 Imports. The total price, with tax, was about $650. I went online and searched for discounted Pier 1 gift cards. I found a bunch and bought them. Here's my order. The column on the left is the card value and the column on the right is what I paid for it.

So I bought $645.74 in gift cards for $516.57. That's a 20% discount. And I bought these cards with a credit card that gives me 1% cash back, so my savings were actually 21%. I don't remember if this was my situation or not, but if you then wait to buy your item at the store until it goes on sale, you can save even more.

I ended up getting $650 worth of furniture for about $520 dollars. That's a savings worth shopping for.

As I mentioned, not all the gift cards these sites sell are good deals. Sometimes the discount is so slight, it's not worth it. And companies have caught on to this practice and sell their cards directly to the sites for small discounts, which get even smaller as they are passed on to you. But if you know you are going to make a large purchase from a specialty store, it worth the few minutes it takes to check these sites for discounted gift cards. You could save a hefty chunk of change and not leave any money on the table.

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Don't Leave Money On The Table: Paribus

Many stores, both traditional and online, offer a buyer protection program where, if the price of an item you purchased goes down within a certain amount of time, they will refund you the difference between the price you paid and the new lower price.  It's cheap marketing for the stores because few people, if any, will ever take them up on the offer. Unless you are spending a large amount of money, most the time, you shop around for a bit, make your purchase, and then stop price comparing.

Online retailers have much more flexibility in changing their prices than traditional stores do. They can alter their prices second by second, based on your past shopping habits, your geographical location (as determined by your IP address), or hundreds of other items. Retailers call this dynamic pricing and it makes it difficult to know when you are getting the absolute best price.

I am a fan of the CamelCamelCamel browser plugin. This plugin will show you the pricing history of an item and you can set up alerts to be notified when a price hits a certain point. Because it's a browser plugin, it can show you the price history without ever leaving the website you are on:

This can help you decide if you should buy something now, or wait until the price drops, based on past history. In all honesty, I only use this when shopping for items costing maybe $100 or more. Otherwise, I tend to just buy whatever I need at whatever price it's at. I don't want to spend time tracking prices for low cost items.

Enter Paribus.

Paribus will track my purchases for me and notify me if the price of something drops after I have purchased it. More importantly, and this is the good bit, Paribus will automatically submit a refund request to the website so that I get the lower price. No action needed on my part! While Amazon's computers juggle their prices, Paribus' computers monitor them and make sure I get the lowest price.

Right now, Paribus works with about 20 of the largest internet retailers, including Amazon, Newegg, Walmart, and Target. See their full list here.

How does Paribus work?

In order for Paribus to work, it needs to know what you bought and for how much. To do this, it scans your email for receipts from retailers, so you'll need to grant it access to the accounts your receipts are sent to. In the case of Amazon, because their receipts do not contain pricing data, you'll need to grant it access to your Amazon account itself. If you are concerned about security, check out their security FAQs here.

In return for finding you money, you agree to pay Paribus 25% of your refund. If they don't get you a lower price, it doesn't cost anything.

Does It Work?

It sounds great, but does it work? I do a large amount of shopping at Amazon, so I figured I'd give Paribus a try. I signed up last week, which was as easy as a couple mouse clicks, and that was it. 5 days later, my wife bought a pair of shoes on Amazon. The next day, I got an email from Paribus saying they found a $23 price drop and submitted a claim. A few hours later, I got a response from Amazon saying they credited me the difference.

That easy. That fast. My wife bought the shoes at $44. We got a $25 refund (the price drop plus sales tax refund). Taking into account Paribus' fee, we saved $18.75 - about 43% - with zero effort!

The Amazon refund was in the form of an Amazon gift card credit, not a credit card credit, but I buy from Amazon all the time, so that's fine. Paribus will charge their fee to my credit card, not take it out of my refund, but that's fine too. I have to say, it's been 10 days since I signed up and I'm pretty impressed!

If you are interested, leave a comment here with your email address and I'll send you a referral code that gives you a 5% discount on any Pairbus charges you get from now until December. (Their terms of service prevent me from posting the code here.) If you don't want your comment / email address published on the blog, say so in the comment and I won't publish it.

(UPDATE: 5-23-16) Amazon has changed their price matching policy. From now on, they will only price match televisions. Given this, I have cancelled my Paribus account, as Amazon was the only retailer I used it with. I wonder if the popularity of sites like Paribus and Earny, which tracked Amazon prices for users, was a contributing factor to this change. Needless to say, I no longer have referral codes to give out.

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Don't Leave Money On the Table: How I Do Vegas

Each year in June, my wife and I take a trip to Las Vegas with her twin sister and her husband. Sometimes their other sister joins us as well. We have a gambling budget and a food / lodging budget. The problem is my wife and I don't agree on how a budget works. My wife thinks a budget is money we planned on spending, so if we spend it all, it's no big deal - we planned on it.

On the other hand, I look at the budgets differently, at least the gambling budget. My goal is to return from the trip with at least as much of the gambling budget as I went with. If we can do this, my reasoning goes, we can possibly take a second trip later in the year, basically for no extra money. (We live within driving distance of Las Vegas and our rooms and meals are usually either comped or at a big discount, so that expense is relatively small.) If I win and come back with more money than I took, that's great, but I don't plan on it. Instead, I try to break even.

This difference in views is a constant source of friction between us on each trip. If we are losing, I'll stop gambling or switch to a game with a lower minimum bet or less volatility - moves designed to make my money last longer. My wife does the opposite - she'll place larger bets or play games with larger payouts but more volatility, with the goal of getting a big win to recoup her losses. And if that doesn't work out, it's not a big deal, her thinking goes, because it was money we planned on spending anyway. She says she's there to gamble and that's what she's going to do.

I am perfectly happy sitting at a blackjack table for 5 hours and coming away even or up or down a few bucks. That's five hours of free entertainment and free drinks. Plus, I've still got my money and can play again later. As the saying goes, a push is as good as a win. If I can manage to do that over the entire trip, I'll have enough of my budget left to make another trip later in the year.

I don't have a way to reconcile our opposing views. The best I've managed to do is just give her her gambling money and don't pay any attention to what she is doing with it.

It should go without saying, but if you are gambling, be sure to join the player's club at whatever casino you are gambling at. Make sure your play is being tracked because that's how you get good offers and comps. Spend a little time investigating how the player's club works. Some casinos are very open about how many points you need to earn certain comps, while others are quite secretive.

The two casinos we frequent most are Wynn / Encore and The Cosmopolitan. The difference between the two player's clubs is quite striking.

The Red Card at the Wynn is fairly secretive about what you need to do to earn comps. They do say you earn 1 point for each $2.50 wagered on reel slot machines and 1 point for each $6 or $15 wagered on video poker, depending on which game / denomination you play. There is no information about how many points you earn for spending money in the hotel, although they do claim you earn something. However, they don't publish any information about points needed for certain rewards. The theory is that everyone is treated individually and that this gives the casino hosts discretion to award comps to people as they see fit. It is, supposedly, a way to show off their great customer service. I call bullshit on this theory. Asking for comps is never something I like to do because it feels almost like begging to me, and when you are turned down, it's even less enjoyable. The standard response from the casino hosts is that you should just charge everything to your room and then, right before you check out, ask if you played enough to get anything comped. I usually get maybe one meal comped. (Although, to be fair, I do get our room for free.) The consensus seems to be that the Red Card is one of the worst casino cards out there. We go to Wynn / Encore because we like the casino environment, but during our trip last month, the scales finally tipped and the gambling negatives finally outweighed the decor benefits.

In contrast, the Identity card at The Cosmopolitan is very explicit about how many points you need for certain comps. It's even published on their website. They are also very clear about how many points you earn for spending money at the hotel. Maybe it's just the engineer in me, but I love the transparency. I love the fact that I know exactly what I am getting and what I need to do to get to the next level. It's like a video game and I'm trying to level up. (As an added bonus, Marriott Rewards hotel points are exchangeable into Identity points and vice-versa, although converted Marriott Reward points do not count towards your Identity tier progression.) Somehow, it's not so distasteful to me to ask for a comp when I know I've earned it and there's no chance of getting turned down. I suppose that is why the begging feeling isn't there.

But wherever and whatever you play, always use your player's club card. It's your key to getting free stuff. Pay attention to the details. For instance, I discovered that Identity points at the Cosmopolitan expire after 1 year of non-use, so if you want to maintain your tier level, go more than once a year (or give your card to someone who is going and will play a few games using your card). Also, know what games earn you points. A trend I have noticed over the years is that video poker typically earns fewer points than slots at just about every casino and the points it does earn are getting fewer and fewer. Vary your play and  don't leave money on the table!

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Don't Leave Money On The Table: Want A Discount? Just Ask!

This is one in a series of short articles about claiming all the benefits you are entitled to – be that discounts, freebies, or whatnot. I’m not going to go to the length of, say, extreme couponing, but I have found there are often discounts or bonuses you can easily take advantage of that can save you money without making major changes in your spending patterns or behaviors.

"It never hurts to ask for a discount."

I can't tell you how many times I've heard that and failed to do so. I've read all sorts of blog posts about people just calling up their credit card company to ask for a lower interest rate, or calling their cable TV provider to ask for a discount. Most of the time, they get that discount. Sometimes they may have to threaten to quit or go to a competitor, but most times, they can usually score some sort of price reduction, if only for 12 months or so.

The recommended method is to research what the competition is offering and then call your provider's customer service number to see if they will match it. It's helpful if you are actually willing to switch providers so if your threat to switch companies doesn't bear fruit, you can actually do so, but that's not necessary. And because most of the discounts people are given expire after 12 months, it's recommended to call back again in a year and see if you can get the lower price extended.

There is actually a company that will do this for you - Billcutterz. I started the process of working with them, but I found their response time too long and the process was dragging out over a couple of weeks, so I got impatient and cancelled the process. I was also a bit nervous because you have to give them a copy of all your bills, plus any passwords or PINs you may have set up on your account so that they can talk to the companies on your behalf.

But the other day, I was downloading my monthly bill from my internet provider and noticed that they were offering new customers the internet package I had for an introductory rate of $59.99 a month for 12 months. I was paying the regular price of $73.99.

Hmm.. I happened to have some spare time that day, so on the spur of the moment, I called the customer service number on my bill to see if they would give me that price. I got an automated routing system and pressed the digits to talk to someone about downgrading or cancelling my service. (This is the department you want to talk to - the customer retention department. They typically have greater latitude on changing your bill than the normal front line order taker would.)

When I got connected to a person, I told them I noticed they were offering new customers my same package at a rate of $59.99 for 12 months and I asked if I could get that same deal. The man I was speaking with told me that was normally only for new customers, but asked if he could put me on hold while he checked to see what he could do.

Well, That Was Unexpected!

I waited on hold for about 3 minutes. When he came back he said he could reduce my price to $51.79 a month for 12 months and would that be acceptable?

Hell, yes! That was lower than I was asking for! I asked (twice) if my service would stay exactly the same. He said it would. He also said after 12 months, my price would go back to my standard $73.99, but that I should call back then to see if there was another deal going on.

So by making a phone call that lasted no more than 5 minutes, I saved $22.20 a month, or $266.40 a year. I did not have to threaten to cancel my account. I did not have to play hardball or resort to any negotiating tactics. I simply called and asked  for a lower price, and they gave it to me. Wow.

Update: Just did the same thing with my TV service. Noticed Dish Network was offering the package I have to new subscribers at $39.99 a month for 12 months. I'm paying $74.99. I called up and asked for a discount. The first time, I got some guy on a really bad connection and he told me that offer was only for new subscribers. Hung up and tried again. I noticed this time I got a totally different set of routing options for my call. I got a clear connection and a woman on the line. I asked if I could get the lower price and she said sure. So I'm getting a $35 a month credit on my bill for the next 12 months. Saved $420 with a 5 minute phone call! (I wonder if my first call was routed to some generic call center off shore somewhere.)

Do you have any tips for not leaving money on the table? Leave them in the comments!

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Don't Leave Money On The Table: Groceries and Gas

This is one in a series of short articles about claiming all the benefits you are entitled to – be that discounts, freebies, or whatnot. I’m not going to go to the length of, say, extreme couponing, but I have found there are often discounts or bonuses you can easily take advantage of that can save you money without making major changes in your spending patterns or behaviors.

For this installment of DLMOTT, I'm going to talk about something we all have to do - buy groceries. (And no, as I promised above, this is not going to be an article about extreme couponing.) Most grocery stores these days have loyalty cards that you can use to get discounts on items you buy. The stores like these cards because it lets them track what you buy and then they can market to you more effectively.

Despite the fact that I regularly post some of my financial information on this website, I am something of a privacy nut. I don't like companies tracking me so they can target me with more ads. But I also want to get all those good deals you get with a loyalty card. So what's a guy like me to do?

Get A Fake ID!

Well, not really. But when you fill out that application for a loyalty card, there is nothing that says you have to use your real information! I filled mine out with a fake name and address. I did not provide an email address, so I miss out on any emailed offers, but if you want to receive those and still retain some privacy, you can easily set up a disposable email address using sneakemail.com or other such services. Sometimes this level of deception isn't even necessary. I have seen some applications that simply have a checkbox you can mark to remain anonymous. You can check that box and not provide any other information on the application. The grocer can still track that someone seems to always buy Kraft Deluxe Macaroni and Cheese together with hot dogs, but they have no way to tie that information back to me. (And I am in no way admitting to such behavior here. No sir. Not me.)

My grocer also has a website where I can go and load electronic coupons onto my loyalty card. I usually check out the site once a week and load coupons for anything that looks like I might possibly buy onto the card. If I don't end up buying it, the coupon expires and it's no big deal, but if I do, I get an automatic discount. These are really bonus savings. There are enough in-store discounts on items that if I don't want to check the website, I can still get decent savings..

Using my card, I routinely save between 12% - 25% on my grocery bills. Again, I only buy the things I would buy anyway.

But wait! That's Not All!

But the card doesn't just give me a discount at the grocery store. My grocer also operates a gas station. Using their loyalty card when I buy groceries lets me earn "fuel points" at the rate of 1 point per dollar spent. 100 points gets me a 10 cent per gallon discount on gas at their gas stations. Points accumulate monthly and do not roll over to following months. I save my points and at the end of the month, I fill up my tank at their gas station, rather than Costco, where I normally get gas, and I save anywhere from 40 to 80 cents per gallon. Their gas prices are normally only 5 cents per gallon higher than Costco, so it's a net 35 to 75 cents savings to me per gallon on a tank of gas once a month.

Yes, there is a little bit more effort involved. I spend about 5 minutes a week loading e-coupons onto my loyalty card and I do have to expend some thought at the end of each month to remember to get gas at a different location than normal, but it's a minimal amount of extra effort. Even without the card, I would still shop at the same grocery store and still buy the same things. By using their loyalty card, I make sure I am not leaving money on the table.



Do you have any tips for not leaving money on the table? Leave them in the comments!

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