A WORD FROM THE AUTHOR: This week I was hit by an unusual amount of incorrect charges on my card. From apples to diet soda (more down below), I realized how much of these insignificant charges can shape your daily, monthly, and even yearly finances. Make sure to check out the below for where to be vigilant in your personal finances. As always, I am not a financial advisor. Enjoy!
Three things to check on your monthly statement
Subscriptions (Spotify, Apple Music, Adobe Suite, etc.)
Monthly insurance rates
Fees (parking tickets, credit cards, bank overages)
The Most Expensive Apples I’ve Ever Bought
This week, I went to the grocery store and bought four red apples for the week as part of my usual breakfast routine. I left the grocery store and looked at my total cost of $80 on the receipt. With a funny feeling in my gut, I skimmed through the receipt and double-checked each of my item’s costs. I noticed the apples totaled $40. That’s $10 per apple!
I went to the cashier and corrected the error, bringing my overall apple cost to $6. If I hadn’t checked my receipt, I would have left the store and willingly paid an exorbitant amount for red apples.
That got me thinking about how much of our daily finances can be contributed to incorrect errors. How much money do we spend because the amount was input wrongly?
Late fees, overdrafts and even fraud cost Americans an extra $577 annually
Make sure you’re double-checking receipts as you’re making purchases. Later in the same week, I went to go eat sushi and was charged for soda when I ordered water. After noticing, I confronted my waitress and she corrected the error for me quickly.
It’s a weird coincidence that I’d been charged incorrectly twice in one week but I wanted to take the time to write about these moments.
Check Your Monthly Statement. Seriously.
When was the last time you downloaded an Excel file from your bank to go through all your monthly purchases? Did you even know that was possible?
Most banks allow you to download a file of all your purchases over a specified date range. From there, you’ll be able to categorize everything into necessities and wants.
I want you to skim through these purchases and see if there’s anything that looks out of the ordinary. Maybe your Internet bill is charging you $20 bucks more than what you thought you had signed up for. In this case, do some digging and see how everything is adding up.
This week is all about the details. Personal finance can be tough and we can become distracted about where our money is going if we aren’t paying attention.
Be sure to fix those incorrect charges and save yourself money over time!
Have a great week,
Jordan