I hate sounding like that old story of the cobbler who never had time to fix his own shoes, but my recent slog through a very soggy Sydney reminded me that my shoes are no longer waterproof.
Shoe shopping is just another errand I haven’t had a moment to get to. The craziness of the holidays, a jam-packed January, and the flurried start to February’s new school term has taken up nearly every spare minute of my time so far this year.
My wet feet finally motivated me to take the advice of Compare Club’s experts – and my own, seeing as I write about comparing to save quite a lot – and I’m kicking myself for not doing it any sooner. Or at least I would kick myself, if my shoes could take it.
Starting my savings with my mobile and broadband package:
My child’s phone ran out of data on the last week of the school holidays. When I went to top it up, I learnt that the prepaid package at $10/month she had wasn’t available anymore.
The new one I could get was $25, and came with only 1GB more data.
So I reached out to my colleague Florence in our utilities team to find out if there were better deals available – and what do you know? There were – and not just for my kid.
Broadband and mobile savings bundle:
Florence asked what I was paying for my phone. I explained it was bundled with my internet and cost $192 for both mobiles and my Telstra broadband. That’s $2304 a year.
Florence found me another offer, which still uses Telstra’s 5G network. I’m now paying $119.90 a month, or $1439 a year.
Saving: $865 for the year.
A Quick Note: Florence and her colleagues also handle energy comparison. If you want to review your utilities package, just fill out our energy comparison form and ask them to look at your broadband and mobile while they’re comparing your energy.
Learn more about broadband charges here.
Health insurance:
Next, I spoke to Compare Club’s senior health insurance broker, Eli Boroda, about my cover – mainly because my premium went up in January, and I was paying around $50 more per month, at $307.
I realised there were parts of this cover I hadn’t used in over six years – not since my child was a lot younger in fact.
At a whopping $3684 a year that was just too much money for cover that wasn’t doing a lot for me and my now adolescent kid – and yes, I’d been with the insurer for several years so I was undoubtedly paying their loyalty tax.
There were things I needed: We both wear glasses, and hers are specialised for dyslexia.
I also require regular physiotherapy, so there were extras I had to keep, especially with a special needs child.
I talked to Eli about this, and he asked who my providers were for various treatments, then recommended a policy that kept all the parts I needed – and minimised the bits I hadn’t used in years.
My new premium worked out to about $20/month less than my old one.
Saving: $236 for the year.
Important Note: Eli went to the extra trouble of looking for a policy that gave me better benefits back for the extras I use most regularly – like dental, optical, and physiotherapy. For example, I’m able to claim $100 more in physiotherapy treatments with my new insurer, than with my old one. Every dollar counts – and I’ll take that extra hundred back in my pocket thanks!
Find out more about comparing health insurance.
Total Savings: $1101
I had two conversations to make this happen, and it took about 30 minutes for my health cover, and 15 or so for the phone and broadband.
Less than an hour to gain back $1101 for 2024. That’s a little over a week’s rent in my pricey Sydney suburb.
The bottom line:
- Even for the ‘big’ items, like health insurance, comparing and switching isn’t that difficult and it doesn’t take that long.
- For smaller items, like mobile phone plans, comparing, switching – and saving – is even faster to do.
- Working with experts who know their products made the process easy.
Now, about those shoes …
