When you're trying really hard to save, sometimes you can make bad decisions that can end up costing you in the long run. I'm sure this will happen to us many more times, unfortunately, but you can learn from our mistakes! Here are some ways we did NOT save money in 2010:
1. Switching to a cheap internet provider. Rogers and Bell are the two big providers where we live, and in 2009, we were ready for a clean break with them. We'd long ago abandoned Bell, and wanted to try this new company that was advertising phone and internet for 30$ a month. Fine print: that's only for the first six months, then it jumps up, but it was still going to be less than we spent with Rogers. It was going fine until we discovered that our phone wasn't always working (remember this?). I don't mind paying for service, as long as I'm getting that service. When our one-year contract was up, we switched back to Rogers and haven't had a problem since. One other regret: when I called to complain and find out when our contract was up, I should have asked for a reduced rate for our final months with Distributel.
2. Border shopping the way I do: on two occasions this year, I went border shopping in the States with some girlfriends. While I use everything I bought and even got a few shower/birthday/Christmas presents early and cheap, I also spent more than I would have liked. It's tricky when you're only there for a brief period of time and you're not sure what you need. However, one of the girls on the trip (I'll call her Mrs. Mac) plans well in advance what she needs, whether it's fabric, food, or fashion, and knows her prices enough to determine what's a good deal. For her, border shopping ends up saving money. I will take lessons.
If I think of any others, I'm happy to pass them along. It's always nice to learn from other people's mistakes.
I think you are a fantastic border shopping companion - perhaps we all need to do it more (together) just for the, um, practice... and to compare notes? ;-)
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