Abstract:
Having professional bill hagglers (billcutterz to be precise) negotiate lower rates on your behalf is a no-brainer, especially because they don’t charge anything unless you save money. The average amount of money to be saved is estimated to be $3,000 every 10 years, and that is after they take their cut.
If you fancy yourself an especially adept haggler, however, you might be able to recoup even more on your own, somewhere in excess of $6,000 every 10 years. Just don’t get too confident, because companies aren’t always afraid to call your bluff or lose you (I know from recent experience).
Introduction:
Ever try to negotiate your own bills? It can be a supreme pain in the butt. Heck, even canceling cable can be a chore. The truth is, however, sometimes the hassle is worth it. There is often a lot of room for savings in monthly bills like:
- Cable
- TV
- Cell Phone
- Utilities
- Auto Insurance
- Etc.
I’ve written before about how these recurring monthly expenses represent a huge and easy way to save money. They are huge opportunities because they happen frequently; they’re not just one-time expenses. And they are easy because once you do the work of finding a better auto insurance policy or negotiating lower cable rates, you don’t have to think about it again until the next renewal period. No extraordinary feats of willpower required.
Sounds great, but what if negotiating your bills is such a pain in the ass that you refuse to even go down that path? Or what, if you’re like me, you just suck at negotiating? (I had my “I want to cancel service if I can’t get the old rates back” bluff called recently and lost internet for 2 weeks.)
We’ll you’re in luck because there is this nifty little service called billcutterz that I just learned about. They do all the hard work for you.
Billcutterz: how it works:
Before I jump into it, this is not paid advertising nor an affiliate post… I really just think it is a cool idea. (I’m amenable to work something out though if you’re listening out there, billcutterz crew)
So the way billcutterz works is that you hand over a few recent bills (cell phone, cable, internet, etc.) and they call each company to do the haggling for you. These are professional negotiators that know all the tricks of the trade.
Supposedly they save their average customers around $500 gross per year (before their cut of the profits). That is not an insubstantial amount. But of course, like any good service provider, they need to get paid too. So they take a 50% cut of whatever they saved you on your bills ($250 per year in this example).
The beauty of this arrangement is that their incentives are almost perfectly aligned with your own. If they don’t save you money, you don’t have to pay anything, and the more they save you, the more they get paid. Not a bad look…
The numbers:
Assuming that billcutterz saves the average person a net of $250 per year, the 10-year ROI stats look like this:
- 10-Year NPV: $3,022
- 10-Year ROI: 3022%
- 10-Year Payback: 0.0 years
Wow, $3,000 for barely lifting a finger! I’ve assumed a 1 hour per year investment on the part of the individual because sending the bills, setting up payment, and talking with billcutterz might take about that long, however, it probably takes less time in reality, especially in the outlying years.
Conclusion
If you’re the kind of person that simply isn’t going to be motivated to renegotiate your own bills, it is probably worth giving these guys a call. They could save you about $3,000 every 10 years on average.
And if you are the kind of person who is going to be motivated to renegotiate your own bills, know to shoot high, for a total savings in the ballpark of $500 per year or in excess of $6,000 per decade, although not being a professional negotiator, $300 – $400 might be a more realistic goal Here are some tips to help you if you want to go the DIY route.
To be fair, I haven’t vetted these guys yet because I already have some pretty great rates on internet, work pays for my cell phone, ms. fg uses republic wireless for super cheap cell service, we don’t have cable or land-line phone, and on and on. Basically we run a pretty tight ship as it is, so I don’t think there’s much juice left to squeeze from this lemon.
Either way, it’s worth evaluating how much you pay in recurring, automated monthly expenses. These expenses can add (or subtract) a lot from your own personal bottom line.