Know how much you are paying for high tech

I was going to write about a tremendously awful transaction with a local big box and one of my customers, but I decided I will save it for another day…unless you the web visitors demand the story. It's a doozey, but unfortunately not unique.

Instead, I want to write about the financial consulting side of my business. I know very little about stock trading, CD's, bonds, gold, and mutual funds, but I do know what technology and telecommunication services cost and how to save money on monthly bills. I still get surprised to find out how many people don't really know how much money they spend a month on phone and Internet service. Often times, I can save people almost $30 per month (that's nearly a new computer a year) and get them better services. At the very least, I can usually keep expenses about the same, but still increase services. Let me illustrate how to approach your tech bills and see if you can benefit from a change.

First, this article applies only to those who have at least a couple of choices of broadband Internet access in their communities.

Next, examine your monthly bills currently. This table represents a typical U.S. household's telecommunication's expense with dial-up service and one phone line:

Typical American broadband customers spend between $15-30 more per month for a total of between $140-214 per month.

A comment I hear often is, "I don't pay for long distance…I use my cell phone." I often think, "Hmmm, do they get free cell phone coverage." Of course not. The myth of the cell phone long distance is that you sometimes don't pay additional charges for a long distance call, but you do pay for it. 

So my savings plan involves performing a little magic with the bills. In many areas of the country, you can 'bundle' your land line, television, and Internet (high speed) services through a local cable company or increasingly through the phone company. Bundle pricing includes all your local and unlimited long distance phone calls, a decent TV package, and high speed Internet for between $90-120. This would make my payment chart now look like this: 

More can be saved in the above scenario if cell phone minutes are decreased since unlimited long distance is included in the bundle. 

For the truly thrifty telecommunications consumer, prices for broadband Internet, long distance phone service, and TV can be half the above amount or less. Here's my "21st Century Tech on the Cheap" scenario:

Admittedly, in the last scenario, you need to be a total tech geek, but it is cheap. The value lies somewhere between the last two scenarios and my point is that too many of us get bilked every months because we didn't take the time to examine what we are paying for these services and more importantly how we use the services. Pull out your bills, lay them out, add them up and then examine your own situation. You might be surprised at how much you are paying for services that you may not fully utilize.  This exercise also illustrates that dial-up Internet is officially dead (except for those truly remote areas where phone service is all that is available).