Saving on Prescription Medications

The quest for saving money on monthly expenses was a continual process, watching where the outflow was going, and wincing once in a while when I saw how much some things cost. Reviewing how much we pay for prescription medications was one of those cringe-worthy moments.

Over a year ago I realized that Walmart had a great deal on prescription meds. It was costing me $15.00/month for a generic medication from our neighborhood pharmacy, when I could get the same prescription for $10.00 for a 3 month supply. That was a no brainer! Savings: $140.00/yr.

The problem wasn't the generic medications, the problem was the non-generic medication my husband was on, which was $90.00/month and was going up to $98.00/month. Now onboard with my new budgeting blitz, he was bothered his medication was costing us so much money, despite having health insurance. He vowed to go on the generic of his medication the next time he saw the doctor.

Before his visit I did some poking around on the internet, and noticed that in a couple places they said to shop around between pharmacies. I thought this would be a good plan, but he was hell-bent on going generic for the big savings. The doctor, however, had other thoughts on the situation.

Announcing to the doctor that the medication was too expensive, and stating he wanted the generic version, the doctor proceeded to inform my husband that there are certain medications you want the name-brand for, and his was one of them. Seems the generics are not as closely monitored in some way, and may not actually be an exact duplicate. The doctor did know of a way around the cost: get double the dose and break the pill in half, making a one month supply equal 2 months. He called the pharmacist, and it was a done deal. The medication now costs $32.00/month!

Saving breakdown:

Original cost of the medication at the new price of $98.00/month for one year: $1176.00
New cost of the medication: $384.00
Annual savings: $792.00

Total annual savings on prescriptions for both of us: $932.00.

Cutting the Cable

For a while, I was a panel member for the local cable company to offer my opinion (never in short supply) on the services they offer, the WiFi in home and out in public, BETA-test APPs for the company, and generally socialize with the other panel members. For this service, we received a $10/mo. Amazon.com reward. Nice little perk for doing something that was actually fun for 30 minutes a week. I didn't have any real criticisms of the company, as we have had excellent service for over 12 years with them, rare service disruption, and good speed on our internet service. We are "triple play" subscribers - internet, phone and TV. Others on the board were complaining about the cost, and while it was getting up there, it was doable, considering we were getting all three services. I did agree that it bothered me that new customers get the price break to join, and those of us loyal customers with over 10 years of patronage didn't rate any perks for loyalty. It was noted by some that their calls to get a price break fell on deaf ears.

Then one day, we all received an email that the panel had run its course and would be ending in two weeks. I was going to miss it; I was surprised that I was actually sad about it. The next month we got our bill and it had gone up! Coincidence? I don't know, and maybe I should have paid better attention to the notices with the statement, but it was in my lackadaisical phase with the bills, just making sure they were paid on time and not paying attention unless an amount changed. The bill went from $159.00 to $174.00. I took note. You may be thinking that it was only a $15 increase. Sometimes it is just the principle of it. We didn't have anything fancy in the form of channels, no HBO or paid stations, no sports package, nothing special at all. We do have one of their DVRs.

This was part of the tipping point with me. Everything was just getting too expensive. Ten cents here, a dollar there, 15 dollars to them - where does it stop? I had to change the constant out flow.

Hearing people talk at work, I have heard that other cable companies made customers jump through hoops. It wasn't good enough to threaten to leave, you actually had to sign up with another company,  and have an appointment for hook up before they would lower your rates. A friend's mother was also told to go ahead and change - they didn't care! So the phone call to beg for a lower rate wasn't top on my list when I decided to take action.

Action started with printing out a list of the stations in our TV package. We both checked off stations we watch on a regular basis. Most of mine fell in the cheaper package, but my husband loves the History Channel. I was willing to give up the DVR, and he agreed to lose the History Channel to save some money.

I called the company and explained it was imperative I lower our expenses, and I would be returning the DVR and wanted the cheaper package for the TV. I did mention how much my husband loves the History Channel, but he was willing to give it up for the sake of the budget. Problem was, the packages I saw online were for the new customers, and that if I changed our package and dropped the one with the History Channel, our bill would actually go up $5.00. 'Scuse me? Go up? Yes, we were grandfathered in and allowed to keep our old rate as long as we do not change anything.

I think the feeling I had was how it actually feels to be between a rock and a hard place. I had to play hardball. I didn't want to do it, but I did. I said the words I didn't want to say: "Perhaps we need to change to the competition," followed by, "I hate to do it. We have been so pleased with your company for over 12 years." She checked the computer, and it was over 12 years, with perfect payment history. It meant nothing. There were no offers available at that time. She did, however, offer to connect me with  customer service for new accounts. I asked what good that would do, and she told me to tell them exactly what I told her, and they may have offers she did not. It was worth a try.

I was connected to a very nice young man, Anthony. I repeated everything I told the other customer service girl, and he checked our history also. Then he came back with the deal of a lifetime: he was able to give us the new customer deal, I could keep the DVR, AND - here it is - FREE HBO for a year. The rate was for one year, and I would have to call back in a year and look for new deals, but this was the nicest thing any company has done for me in longer than I can remember. I thanked Anthony many times, and I came away with a new respect for their customer service.

After taxes and fees, the new rate is $137.00, a $37/mo decrease. It paid to make the dreaded phone call, and I am not only saving money, but have a new-found respect for our provider.

Total savings for one year: $444.00.

Savings on Ice

We are relatively new boat owners, and we do use our boat more than the average boat owner. We are out on the water about two times each week, and the boat is in the water from April to November. On hot summer days, we spend a lot of time at anchor sitting and having a cool drink, and pack food for lunch or dinner. The cost of bagged ice can add up over the course of a year for boat owners, or those who entertain a lot, unless you make it yourself. Ice cube trays are tedious. Bags of ice in the freezer can take up a lot of room and leak. The cost of bagged ice to fill the cooler can be $8 a day, with each bag costing $4.00. There had to be a better, cheaper, way.

A visit to my father's house showed me a better way. He froze many blocks of ice using throwaway containers from margarine, or other items you buy in plastic containers with lids, and used the bricks of ice to filled his cooler. Brilliant! Free ice at the ready whenever you need it. I had to give it a try.

I found that the bricks of ice using larger containers were too large for our smaller cooler. I tried using sandwich-size Rubbermaid containers that I found in the pantry closet, sitting unused, to make bricks of ice for our cooler. The smaller bricks allowed me to put them in between the cans or bottles and put a layer on top. I also experimented with freezer bags with the ziplock tops to make pillows of ice for the cooler, hoping that they wouldn’t leave water throughout the cooler. It works, however some of the bags do burst and the water leaks out. Not a big deal.

There are only two small drawbacks, if you can call them that, and that would be the blocks need to be prepared a day in advance, and the need for enough space in the freezer to make the bricks of ice. The sandwich containers work well because they stack in the freezer and take up very little space. Also, recent news reports state that freezers that are well packed cost less to run. I have seen reports to the contrary, so you need to investigate this a little bit more on your own.

As for the savings, we would spend at least $100 on ice for boating season, and that is most-likely a gross underestimation. Now the ice is free.

Total savings: at least $100! 

The time savings is also noted - now we don’t have to go to the store before each time we go to the boat.

The Cost of a Gigabyte

We live in the electronics age, and there is no need to debate it. When I started using computers, we thought in terms of Kilobytes. KBs changed to MBs, then to GBs, now to Terabytes. And they cost. How do you put a price on connectivity? You and I don't, we are paying whatever the companies that service our needs decide. And it seems like they change their minds. A lot.

My foray into the world of mobil data started with a need to use my iPad at work. My original iPad was the WiFi version, and my room is in my place too far from the WiFi source to be able to take advantage of it. The computer in my room was not on the router either. I heard about MiFi - a personal WiFi device - that could get me connected. I was thrilled. We went to get the device, and when trying to choose a plan, they showed me a chart of potential use scenarios and the cost of the GBs. Anticipating using it a lot, and based on their chart, I got the 5 GB for $50/mo. plan. I got the 2 year contract, and went on my merry way. The device worked well, speed was good. I was happy.

Fast forward to the launch of iPad2, with 3G built in. The original iPad was great, and iPad2 was an excellent upgrade. The plus side was that if you didn't sign on to 3G during a monthly billing cycle, you didn't get charged. I fell for that line...hook, line and sinker. Seriously, who is NOT going to sign on if they are capable? The price of the 3 GB level was $30/mo. when I started my data plan. The MiFi sat and collected dust now. But I still have a contract, so I am still paying. My husband has iPad1, but he has no reason to use the MiFi because he is not that connected, aside from his computer. My husband has never texted. Yes, I heard your audible gasp. He can build super computers from scratch, but cannot send a text. He says it is all motivation. But I digress.

Do people actually monitor their GB usage? I know I didn't. As long as I didn't go over, and didn't see an over-use charge on the bill, I really didn't pay attention. [I did catch that the carrier charged me for texts that someone sent the MiFi, and I made them give me my money back and block texts to it. Just because it has a number, they can charge a text fee? You CANNOT text from a MiFi, nor read a text. Don't charge me! I wonder how much they make on that little scam a month!] Then I started on my quest to get the bills cut down, so I looked at the GB use on both devices. MiMi sat home collecting dust, and really only came out a couple times for work, and was used during hurricane Irene in August, 2011, because the cable went out and the home WiFi was down for 2 days. Other than that, I was donating $50.00/mo to the carrier. The iPad2, despite what I thought was heavy use for work, and some home use if I forgot to change the setting to WiFi, still never hit the 3 GB limit. I was wasting money on GB every month.

I called the cellphone carrier, who was also the MiFi carrier, and cut the plan down to their lowest plan: 250 MB for $30/mo. Yup! You read it right, it is not a typo. MB, not GB. I vented to the poor woman who was assisting me that it was a ridiculous amount of money for 250 MB. She said it was because 3G is not so popular anymore, and the plans are geared to 4G. I think that is company line for: Why don't you upgrade and buy the NEW device? It would have cost me $250 to cancel the contract early, so I had no choice. I just wanted to get to the end of the contract in October, 2012, and be done with MiFi.

Bottom line on MiFi: $20/mo. saving for 6 months left on the contract = $120.00 saved this year.

Back to the iPad2 plan.

I was getting 3 GB for $30/mo. The lowest plan is now 1 GB for $20. Again, the numbers are at the whim of the carrier. However, I have surprisingly NOT gone over the 1 GB, and am now saving $10/mo.

Bottom line on iPad2: $100 savings for the year, March - December, 2012.

Total data savings for 2012: $220.00.

Personally, I am not a big texter, and because I have the iPad, I never got a fancy phone. In fact, my husband and I both have our LG VX8300 phones since January of 2007. They work great, although in the past year I have had a couple kids ask me, "What is that?" The old flip phone is in perfect condition as we both use cases. It is not texting friendly by any stretch of the imagination, and now work wants to text me. The most frugal solution was to get Text Free, now known as Pinger (http://www.pinger.com) on my iPad.  FREE texting, and FREE phone calls APP to APP. I can talk to a friend in Greece who has the APP on her iPad, too, for free! How great is that? Texting is so easy on the iPad with the big keyboard. Pinger also allows you to buy phone minutes (you can have free texting on your iPhone, and buy 1000 minutes for $19.00). I would get an iPhone if I knew I could purchase a minimal data plan, and use Pinger exclusively. We share a 700 minute/mo. plan now with a major carrier, and have never gone over the limit.

So check your GB usage and downgrade if you can. The same would go for your calling plan. Our savings is $220.00 for a partial year. Next year will be even more. And check out Pinger, or any of the other services of that nature, and see if they are right for you. If you have any questions, just leave them in the comments and I will get back to you. And if you know if an iPhone can be bought with only a data plan, I would love to know that too.

Playing the Game to Win

Grocery shopping, I have learned on my budget journey, is a game. It is Me vs. Proctor & Gamble, Me vs. The Store, Me vs. Betty Crocker, and there was no way Betty was gonna win. Not if I had a say in things.

Why do I say it is a game...

I guess I started thinking of it that way to motivate myself to do my best at being a smart shopper, and allowing us to still enjoy all the brands we had used all along. Certain things about the grocery game annoy me, and pits consumer against company. Take a 2L. bottle of soda (pop in other areas of the country). The current cost is $1.89 - $1.99. The price has risen consistently over the years for flavored water with bubbles. A couple price increases were when most things rose in price because the price of gas increased, and I understand the cost to get goods to market was high. However, when the cost of gas decreased, the shelf prices did not. Not a penny. So the companies see they can still sell their product at the higher price, people bought it, and that was apparently a price point the market could bear. Now take into account that, on any given week, soda is on sale for 89-99 cents, and the companies are not being charitable and giving the product away out of any sense of benevolence, they are still making a profit that suits their profit margins. Think about that next time you pay full price for a bottle. When paying full price for a bottle hurts, you are now a member of the team, and you are in the game.

I am not singling out the soda manufacturers for any reason other than a quick comparison. Every company is guilty of the same pricing based on rising costs, but never lower the price when their cost goes down. That said - back to the game.

The object of the game, as I choose to play it, is to get the grocery brands we like, with few substitutions, but on sale either by store sale price or by coupon, and if the planets align and the sun is shining just so, a combined sale price plus coupon savings. Be still my heart. Extreme couponers live for those deals. They have elaborate tracking systems. Realistically, I am in the game to win, but not at the cost of devoting my life to this. An hour a week, yes, making it a living? No. So realistically, you can glean some information from this blog, and save a bit of cash, maybe even an easy thousand a year.

I stipulated the grocery brands we like because I have made the mistake of buying store brand food items and been disappointed. Once in a blue moon you may actually find a product that tastes pretty darned close, but to me, it is rare. I think there was a cereal in a bag years ago that was good, but paying $5.00 for a frozen pizza and throwing it away because it is inedible is a waste of money. The picture may look like DiGiorno, but believe me, DiGiorno's owners can sleep soundly that the store brand is no competition. I have found, however, that paper goods tend to be good buys for the store brand. Things we buy store brand include facial tissues, paper plates, plastic cups, plastic cutlery, napkins, sandwich, freezer and kitchen garbage bags, and dishwasher soap. You may have other things you have tried, and if you like them, great! Leave me a comment and let me know what else to look into.

That covers the obvious savings of store brand. Now let's look at popular brands and how to save.

My shopping game starts each week with the delivery of the local store circulars. We get about 8 or so different ones every Wednesday, and I look at the big 3 that we frequent. By "look at" I mean I check them for any coupons that will take say $5.00 off your total order of $30.00 or more. The store that offers that is in the lead for the week as to who will get our business. They will at least get a portion of it. That means $5.00 of free food or goods, and $5.00 more stays in our bank account. Every little bit helps.

The circulars for all 3 of our choice stores are online by Thursday, some go live on Wednesday. I wait and look at them all in one sitting. I quickly go through the categories and add items to the cart that we use. I never buy an item because it is on sale, just to buy the sale item. It has to be a brand we like. If we don't like it and it gets tossed, that is no savings at all. I now have three lists, and I can see that 2 stores have our brand margarine on sale, and one is 50 cents cheaper. They also have 15 items we use on sale, whereas the other store has 8. It's a no-brainer. The $5.00 off your order coupon wasn't at this store, so I will look at the items for the store with the coupon, look at my coupons, see what I can get there, and make a quick special trip.

Some people will shop many stores. My mother was a consummate budgeter, and she shopped many different stores in a week to save money. I did not get her genes for patience.

So, to summarize the grocery dilemma of over-spending on groceries, and playing my little grocery game, it boils down to:

1. maintaining a well stocked pantry,
2. knowing what is in the pantry and refrigerator before shopping,
3. reviewing the weekly store sale circular,
4. making a list
5. shopping for sale items,
6. using my clipped coupons
7. using store saving coupons for total order
8. and keeping the preparation time expenditure to an hour or less a week.

With those points made, it is not rocket science, and no I didn't invent any of it, and you may do it better than I do. I know that. But sometimes, just once in a while, you can connect with someone and make a difference. And they, maybe even you, didn't have to spend a dime for some online download, or a dollar for a book. Plain and simple, these things worked for us, and took our weekly grocery bill from a $200.00/week average to $120.00/week average. Total annual savings = $4,160.00.

The Fascinating World of Couponing

I think most people have seen a news segment or a TV show that focused on the woman or man who was an “extreme” couponer. That is not what I ever set out be, nor did I ever turn out to be one. That said, I do get bit of a thrill when I hand my pile of coupons to the cashier and the total keeps going down, down, down.

The road to successful couponing is a journey that each person must take for themselves, as there is no right way or wrong way, but rather what works for you, the time you have to give to it, and how far you wish to take it. What follows is my personal venture into savings using coupons.

I used to subscribe to the Sunday paper years ago when I was living in a condo, but the paper kept getting stolen before I got out of bed on Sunday. I did a stake-out of the paper one weekend, after paying for a month’s worth of papers I never got to read. I got up extra early and sat on my sofa where I could see the paper on the mat through the crack at the bottom of the door. I hear a door open in the hall, and WHOOSH! the paper is gone and I hear the door across the hall slam. Ok, this is truly an awkward situation. After considering what just happened, not being a confrontational person, I figured they were the thieves, and I was going to stand up for my rights. I ring the bell, the wife answers the door, looks disgusted, and calls her husband – the thief – to deal with me. Yes, he did indeed steal my paper every week to read the music section. Don’t feel sorry for the guy. We were on the penthouse floor. He could afford his own paper. After hearing paper thievery was rampant in the building, I canceled the subscription. After moving into the house with my husband, I figured it was safe to order the Sunday paper again. Not so much. Seems the paper people (they are not young kids here, they are adults) drive by and throw the paper on the end of the driveway. Not a good thing in rain or snowstorms. Canceled again.

Years pass, literally, and I don’t use coupons. Then printable, online coupons came to be. I jumped on board, but quickly got disillusioned for 2 reasons. First, it was costing me printer ink, which is not cheap, and the coupons seem to be the same products over and over. There is only so much yogurt or Pillsbury rolls or Cheerios one can eat. Or not.

Then I got this strange idea – look for coupons on eBay. I have no idea where I got the idea to look there, but there it was. People selling 100 coupon packs for a few dollars. Disclaimer: they are not actually “selling” coupons, but rather you are paying for their time to cut and send them to you. This was nothing short of perfection in my budget quest. I get coupons, don’t have to cut them, and somebody is making money from my admitted cheapness and laziness. Win-Win situation, I think. Average outlay for this amazing service is $3-$8.00 per month, depending on how good the coupons are, who and where you get them from, and how many you anticipate needing. The savings far out-weigh the cost.

Looking at the budget, and what we tend to buy the most, I was also able to search by product. If you have a baby, you can get just baby item coupons, just diaper coupons, etc. If you have a dog, there are just dog food coupons. I needed to stock up on Magic Erasers since I use them a lot for cleaning our house and boat; there they were, 10 for $2.00 plus shipping of 55 cents. $2.55 to save $20.00. The only limit is your imagination when searching eBay for coupons.

The next thing is to have a system once you have your pile of coupons, either from actual self-clipping or using the eBay route. I used a couple systems, like organizer wallets, but leafing through the coupons in the store got old fast. I am not a leafer. I use these clear, pocket pages that collectors of baseball cards use, that come in many sizes. They work because I can put all the coupons for certain departments on a page, I can see the expiration dates for ease of use and tossing old coupons, and it has cut a lot of time off the system. (HINT: these are also available on eBay!) I leave the binder at home – I did take it once to the store and got looks from people. I now just take the coupons I wish to use in an envelope to the store.

Anyone who uses coupons has to admit to the thrill of watching the number on the screen at the cash register drop. The more it drops, the more puffed with pride I get that I am beating the system. I’ll get into that in my next post. And if it ends in a jealous look from the person behind me when I am not paying a lot of money for a cart of groceries, that just makes my day…sometimes my week.

My system has shaved a range of $30-$50.00 per week off our grocery bill in coupon use alone. On the low end of savings, that is $1,500.00 in savings per year. But the ways to save do not end there.  But I’ll end there because I know you are just itching to get over to eBay and see this money saving world of which I have written. Go look…enjoy the savings!

Needs vs. Wants and Rationalizations

With a few of our shopping faults discovered, we started making headway. I made a shopping list, but we often veered off the path and without a doubt, after we would check out, I would get angry with myself that we had not saved as much as I had hoped. We were still in the baby steps phase as I look back on it now, but there was something else at play that I figured out after one shop.

Rationalization. There it was. The word came out of my husband’s mouth as we were pushing the cart to the car. I was complaining that the bill was higher than I had anticipated and would have liked, and I wondered out loud that if I hadn’t gotten the magazine, the bill wouldn’t have been as high. At that point, my husband stopped dead in his tracks and said, “You always rationalize things. If we hadn’t gotten toilet paper, the bill would have been lower, too!” Sarcasm noted, but he got me thinking deeper into spending. To a degree, I think most people, at one time or another, have rationalized spending:

I got a promotion! Let’s go celebrate!

I quit the job I hated, and I am free! I bought myself a new handbag because I deserve it after putting up with that office.

I have a hot date so I need a hot new pair of shoes.

My girlfriend dumped me so I bought a new Wii to occupy my spare time.

All rationalizations for spending. If money is no issue, then it needs no further thought. We all at one time have used spending to feel better about the bad stuff, or to celebrate the good stuff. And that is fine. But at some point, when you want to get a lasso around your budget, you have to seriously account for things – needs vs. wants.

I started to ask myself before each purchase outside the grocery store: is this a need or a want? If it wasn’t a need, then I would wait a week and see if I still wanted it. This was tough, because as I mentioned above, or rather as my husband pointed out, I could rationalize with the best of ‘em! But it really wasa big step, because it kept me thinking about staying on track with our spending.

Like every woman, I have my vise; for some it is shoes, for some handbags, some like jewelry, but for me it is cosmetics. And iPad apps, but that is a whole different post. I love makeup, I have since my late teens. Anyone who can go without makeup is as lucky as they get, but I am not one of them. I went to a pizza place to pick up some pizza without my usual makeup, and the guys treated me like a second-class citizen. The next time I went in with my makeup on and it was, “Señora! What can I get for you today?” “You come over here so I can help you!” Yes, makeup is my friend. But in the realm of budgets, it can also be my foe.

Unfortunately, I have extremely sensitive skin. I have tried the makeup from the drugstore, and it causes me dermatitis. A friend’s wife sells a popular brand of makeup, and my husband asked me to buy some from her as a friendly gesture. I explained that it wasn’t a good idea because of my sensitive skin, but did it as a favor. After one application my skin was a blotchy, red disaster that took two months to get back to normal. I gave the makeup away to a friend. After trials of many brands, and a box full of products that gave me skin problems, I found that the one makeup and skin cream I can count on is Clinique. It isn’t cheap. This wasn’t me rationalizing, it was a clinical, painful, ugly fact that only Clinique could solve. [For the record: I am in no way, nor is anyone I know personally affiliated with the company. The product just works for me.]

In my new habit of price checking and comparison, I am now aware that an eyeliner pencil can be $5.00 for most, but for me they are $15.00 so my eyes don’t get puffy. Now my one obsession, and yes, I think it truly is one, is also an expensive one. I need to always use the needs vs wants rule when I go to their website after they send me the VIP email with the weekly deal. Do I want the new blusher and matching lipstick? Of course I do! I want the two different shades that are “IN” this season! Then I say to myself, do I need them? No, the other blush isn’t anywhere near gone, and really, will anyone notice that “Precious Posy” is last season’s color? I think not. And if they are so astute to the hues of makeup, then they should be in the fashion world and not in mine.

There you have it: some spending boils down to rationalization, and to control it, you need to consider needs vs. wants.