Cable Company Madness
I received my Comcast bill this month and I was unhappy to discover it was $60 higher than it was last month. Apparently, my eligibility for their ’special’ (i.e. regular – who pays retail for cable anyway?) prices was up, so they thought maybe they could jack up my rate without anyone noticing. Talk about a load of crap – that’s a $720 price increase for the entire year. It really bugs me when utility companies think they can get away with this stuff. I was tempted to just cancel my service right then and there.
However, since I didn’t feel like spending a vacation day waiting around for Verizon to set up FIOS, I gave them a call to see what they would do to keep me as a customer. I talked to their standard customer service rep, told him my problem, and mentioned “I received an advertisement from Verizon for what appears to be the same level of service for about what I was paying before.” Talk about magic words.
Less than five minutes later, his manager (probably actually someone in retentions) has me set up with a deal that’s better than my old one (faster Internet) for $4 less a month than I was paying before. Amazing. And all I had to do is give them a call.
Think about this – I just effectively made $2800/hr since the call took me no more than 15 minutes. Would you do something, even if it made you a bit uncomfortable, for that much money? Have you ever made that much money in such a short period of time before? When people tell me that comparison shopping is too much of a hassle, or that they don’t like the awkwardness of asking for a discount, sometimes the only thing I can do is shake my head. You can get huge discounts if you know who to talk to and what to say. Next time one of your bills (cell phone, cable, Internet, whatever) comes in, and you think it should be lower, try making this call:
Company: Hi there, what can I do for you today?
Me: I just got my most recent bill, and I’m unhappy with the cost – I would really like to be spending less money on this every month. Can you help me out with that?
Company: I’m afraid there isn’t much I can do for you, I’m sorry.
Me: Really? Well XYZ company is offering the same level of service for less – maybe I should consider switching.
[if there is no competition, you can say you are considering canceling your service outright - that works just as well]
Company: Before you do that, let me see if my manager has anything he can do.
[two minutes on hold]
Company: My manager has authorized me to put a $25 monthly credit on your account – is that acceptable?
Me: Sounds great!
Okay, so a $25 monthly credit doesn’t sound like much, but that’s $300 a year, all from a 10 minute phone call. You just made yourself $1800/hr – it’s that easy. Congratulations!
Strippernomics
The economics of stripping amaze me sometimes. There you are, participating in a friend’s bachelor (or bachelorette, I suppose) party, and you’re being harassed by naked people who want your money because they took their clothes off. But they won’t actually do anything for it that they won’t already do for free (well, maybe with the exception of a lap dance). Why would anyone throw money at these people? How is that fun?
You’re right – I just don’t see the appeal. I get the whole ‘right of passing’ thing that goes along with it being a bachelor party, but couldn’t we find a better way to be debaucherous, other than paying some naked girl to pretend like she is the guy’s girlfriend and not have sex with him?
Now that I’ve ranted a bit, the reason I wanted to talk about this here is that I think this is a brilliant business model, since it literally has people throwing money at you and there is almost no investment on your part, other than a bit of shame and some of your time. I’m not suggesting that people go out and do this for a living, but if you’re looking to make some extra money, it behooves you to consider businesses that require very little or no capital investment.
If you already have a sale-able skill, such as writing or programming, those are perfect because they don’t require you to spend any money to make money in return. I’m sure other skills fit this bill just as well. Maybe the answer to your financial issues isn’t to spend a bunch less money (although that can be good), and rather focus on ways to bring more in every month. Even if that means working at the strip club outside of town…
Call your utility providers, get a discount
It’s amazing how many discounts a person can get, if they are only willing to ask for them. Fixed monthly charges, like your cable bill, are one of the areas where a lot of people are leaking money out of their bank accounts. Some of these providers (like the water company) have local monopolies, and have no impetus to negotiate with you unless you meet one of the legal qualifications that require them to give you a lower price (if you do, take advantage!). But cable companies (not to mention monthly subscription services like Netflix) know you don’t have to spend your money with them, and are more likely to negotiate.
When FIOS became available in my neighborhood, and I started receiving fliers with Verizon’s best deals, I decided to give Comcast (my cable provider) a call to see if they would meet (or beat) Verizon’s deal. I didn’t feel like sitting around all day waiting for Verizon to come by to switch my service, but they were offering a better price. This can work for you too,as almost everyone has more than one entertainment provider available to them (satellite, cable, etc). If you don’t, you always have the option of over-the-air (antenna) or Internet (Hulu, Netflix streaming, etc) solutions.
Here’s how the conversation I had with Comcast went:
Comcast #1: Thank you for calling Comcast. How can I help you today?
Keith: Verizon just installed FIOS in my neighborhood, and I was thinking about switching. But I thought I would give you guys a call to see if you wanted to match the offer they are giving me.
Comcast #1: Let me transfer you to our retentions departement.
Keith: Thanks.
(next came about the shortest wait I’ve ever had on hold)
Comcast #2: Hi Keith, I understand that Verizon has just installed FIOS in your neighborhood, but you’re interested in staying with Comcast?
Keith: Yeah, I don’t really want to wait around to have them install it to my house, but they are offering me the same service for $30/less a month.
Comcast #2: Ok, Keith, let me see what I can do! (30 second pause) I see on your account that you currently have Cable, an HD DVR, and HBO. You said that Verizon is offering you the same service for $30 less?
Keith: That’s correct.
Comcast #2: I can offer you a special deal where we give you the DVR for free for the next 6 months, HBO free for a year, and $15/month off the top of your cable and Internet bill. That should bring you down by $40/month for the first 6 months, and $28/month for the remainder of the year. Would that be acceptable?
Keith: That sounds great, thanks!
Yeah, it was that easy. Granted, I didn’t push for even more (I could have), but I felt like I was getting a good deal. If the first agent hadn’t been willing to transfer me to retentions, I would have asked for the cancellation department. Either way, it’s much less expensive for them to keep you as a customer at a discount, as it would be to invest the money in replacing you. So if they can keep you happy while still making a profit off of you, they will.
Internet Shopping Hacks
I’m not someone who needs to have a ton of stuff in general, but I am definitely a technophile and have a habit of buying expensive things if I’m going to buy something at all. However, for a long time I didn’t actually have the money to buy the things that I wanted. Obviously, this was a problem. I didn’t want to dig into my savings, but I also wanted that shiny new gobbledygook that Orange released last week.
So I developed some rather advanced shopping patterns to make sure I payed as freaking little as possible for everything with the minimum amount of difficulty. Before I continue though, I want to say that I don’t generally do all of these things every time I make a purchase. If we’re talking about a smaller item (say, under $100) I might just hit Live Cashback or Fat Wallet and take the lowest price I can find there. I’ll take my cashback from them, and the few percent I’m getting back from my rewards card, and assume I’m not getting ripped off.
I only go through this process when I’m making a big purchase. It can be a pain in the ass. Don’t fear, though, you’ll get through it. Several months back, I ended up getting a brand new Dell XPS 1330 (fully loaded, same model even now costs more than $1100 after shipping and taxes) for $620 shipped. I spent a bunch of time getting the price down, but it was worth it (and a good bit of that time was just deciding exactly what to get – my criteria was ‘as small as I can get with a dvd player’).
Here’s a list of all the accounts you should sign up for first (if you haven’t already):
- Paypal (most cashback sites require this)
- Live Cashback (requires paypal)
- Fat Wallet
- eBay
- eBates
The idea is to marry as much cash back and discounts together as you can. It’s like the coupon game that some stay-at-home mom’s play, but for the Internet age, and can lead to huge discounts. There are some powerful site combinations here that you should be aware of – the most powerful of which is the ebay/live cashback combo(requires paypal).
I don’t have enough time to go into all of these shopping hacks in detail, but the deal with eBay and live cashback is you can get x% cash back from ebay, immediately credited to your paypal account, for any ‘Buy It Now’ purchase. So you can go to the live cashback page, search for an item, compare store prices (with cashback that you get in about a month), and then check out eBay through the sponsored link to possibly save even more.It will look something like what you see to the left. I guess tonight (I’m writing this on Sunday evening) you get 8% eBay cashback.
I will generally check all of the retailers on these sites to find the best base price / cash back combo I can find. I will also hit up Froogle and make sure that the Google spyders don’t have something even better. Then I start hunting for coupon codes. For tech stuff, I like GotApex but in general, I usually just search Google for codes. If what I am looking for is from a specific site or manufacturer, I will go with something like “Dell coupon code” or “Dell Certificate” and check out what pops up. If the site I’m looking to shop at has some sort of special name for their coupon codes, I’ll also do a search for that.
This level of comparison shopping can take you just as far, if not further, than negotiating can at a store. Stores have a lot more overhead, so in general they are going to have higher prices – a warehouse that doesn’t have to pay salespeople to sell their stuff can usually cut you a better deal. With a little research and some time investment, you can save hundreds (and possibly thousands) of dollars off a major purchase.
Sales, lies, and videotape
Last week, I started in on cutting down on big expenditures – by focusing on the big things, you can get big wins that will significantly help your budget. Personally, I tend to make two or three purchases a year that fall into the ’significant’ category, and this weekend I pulled the trigger on one of them. I decided it was finally time to upgrade to a ‘big boy’ bed (moving from a full to a queen – I don’t have room in my house for a king-sized anything, unless it’s a Hershey’s bar). My girlfriend and I went on a bed shopping extravaganza, and I learned quite a bit about mattress shopping that I didn’t know before. Seriously, I think most mattress salesmen were guys who were rejected by the crappiest used car lot in town.
I’ve worked in sales before selling cell phones, so I know that commissioned salespeople don’t have to be smarmy or disreputable to get a sale. I feel like I should be able to trust a good salesman to offer me a fair price that I shouldn’t need to fight for, and I’d be more likely to buy if I was comfortable with them. And they shouldn’t have to make up crap to get a sale – I’d rather he (or she) tell me they didn’t know than pretend they were an expert but in fact were feeding me a line of bull.
What did I learn? First off, mattress retailers are leaning on the semi-recent Supreme Court decision to allow minimum retail prices to try to boost their commissions. I received several versions of “the manufacturer won’t allow us to sell it any lower.” This used to be illegal, but now it’s just immoral. There are two bed companies, Tempur-pedic and Select Comfort, who set their prices like that (and even then you can usually get a discount online or by calling the companies directly). The rest of them don’t – one mattress salesman who was trying to sell me a mattress (very comfortable) told me that he couldn’t reduce the price on the mattress because the manufacturer wouldn’t allow it. Of course, I checked later online and found the same mattress for $500 cheaper than the price he quoted me. Granted, I was not on my negotiating A-game this weekend, but that is unacceptable.
I also had one salesman tell me that the ‘computer had glitched’ and he could still give me Memorial Day pricing. Okay, that’s great if you are willing to extend me last week’s sale price, which is really the same price you always sell the mattress at, just without the haggling, but don’t lie to me.
Also, I discovered that two people should probably not share a bed, because it’s freaking impossible to get something that both of you will love. I am a soft bed sleeper, and my girlfriend is a hard bed sleeper. Suffice it to say, we spent two days going to about 11 different bed stores (including a few department stores) and the only bed we found that we could both agree on was a Select Comfort, and then only because she could make her side of the bed super hard and I could go with a less firm feel.
It turned out that it was also one of the only hypoallergenic beds that either of us liked. So of course I bought one of those. I’ve been a Select Comfort owner for many years, so she didn’t have to twist my arm much. I am willing to pay for quality, and the extra few hundred dollars will make both our lives a lot easier.
Since Select Comfort doesn’t give their salesmen any wiggle room on the prices (or at least both stores I went to stonewalled me), I decided to put my Internet shopping skills to good use and find some coupon codes. Turns out they have a model, identical to the one I tried out in the store, that is being discontinued and is $750 off. Good deal, we’re getting down into the price range of high quality innerspring mattresses now, so I don’t feel so bad about the overage. But I’m not satisfied. I am a current owner and SC offers a previous owners discount on most of their beds, but not for clearance items like this one. However, they do still allow for the ‘new customer’ $50-off codes. Turns out, they will actually accept two of them, so I ended up getting an upgraded bed for $850 off list, which isn’t bad, although I would have loved an even deeper discount. I did buy it on my rewards card, so I should get a few extra percentage back that way as well.
I have some pretty severe Internet shopping tactics that I use when I am looking to make a big purchase. Cashback sites, coupon codes, comparison systems, and the like are all tools of this particular trade. Since the beginning of the year I’ve made a few major purchases, and other than this bed I also got a new $1300 Dell laptop for less than $600. Sometimes it takes a bit of work, but it’s worth it. Want to know the details? You’ll have to check back tomorrow.
Make it easier to say yes!
One of the simplest, but most detrimental mistakes a negotiator can make is to make it easy to say no. The fact of the matter is, if you’re in a retail setting where your average employee isn’t making a commission, they have little or no actual incentive to help you save ten dollars on that new Halo video game you want. If you go up to them and say something like ‘Can you sell me this game for less than the sticker price?’ the easiest answer for them to give is no.
Don’t get me wrong, sometimes just asking will get you what you want. But most of the time, you either need to be persistent or find another way to make it easier for them to say yes.
Think of it this way – we all have to ask people for help in our daily lives. The fact is, none of us live in a bubble, and we are all reliant on someone to do something for us. Asking someone to reduce the price of an item for you is a lot like that, but we need to find a way to incentivize the activity. Lots of people have a ‘default no’ answer built in because they deal with crappy people every day who treat them poorly. Some people just like being difficult.
Okay, so what can you do? In a retail environment, you are pretty limited, but here are the things that I find are most successful for me:
- Treat the employee as if they were one tier more important to you than they actually are
- Ask for what you want in a way that makes the person you are addressing have to think about the question
- If they say no, restate the request and ask them again – perhaps with a new twist
- If all else fails, ask them if there is someone else in the store that can help you
#1 is a great way to break through the natural barriers you’ll see in lots of retail outlets. Most people treat retail employees like servants (or worse). Simply taking the time to learn their name, smile, and treat them with some respect will get you closer to your goal than you can imagine. Even if they know it’s because you want something from them, that’s okay, because everyone wants something from them.
The next part can be almost as important. Instead of just asking for a discount, it’s best to phrase the initial question in such a way that they know what you are asking for without giving a knee jerk reaction. This throws people off just enough to make them think “hmm, maybe I actually CAN give them a 10% discount.”
If they do turn down your request, it’s okay to repeat your request one more time and ask them for assistance. If they say no again either they just don’t want to help you, or they can’t. The only appropriate follow-up to this, other than choosing whether or not to complete the transaction, is to ask if there is anyone in the store (i.e. a manager) that might be able to help.
Here’s a transcript of how shopping for an HDTV at your local electronics store might go:
TV Shack Employee: Can I help you with anything?
Me: Yeah, that’d be great! My name’s Keith, and you name is…?
Or, if he was wearing a name tag, I’d go with “Yeah, that’d be great Mike! My name is Keith – it’s nice to meet you.”
TV Shack Employee (Mike): My name is Mike, nice to meet you. What are you looking at today?
Me: Hi Mike – I’m looking at this HDTV over here. I was wondering if you had any sales going on that might bring the price down a bit.
Notice I just asked for a discount here, but phrased it in a way that keeps the dialog open.
Mike: (Mike checks in the computer for the current list price) Sorry, that unit isn’t on sale.
Me: Really? I like this unit but it’s more than I want to spend. Can anything be done to reduce the price?
I did not say I couldn’t afford it, just that it was more than I wanted to spend. Don’t lie, ever – it makes people not trust you and that makes them less likely to help. Also note that I didn’t ask him for a discount directly, because if there was a coupon around he could give me to save 10% that would be an acceptable solution as well.
Mike: Personally, there isn’t much I can do, but let me ask my manager. (At this point, Mike is invested in getting you that TV and is actively trying to get you a better price) My manager says I can give you $200 off the price of the TV – would that be acceptable?
Me: Absolutely – thanks for your help!
I know, you’re going to tell me that it would never go down that way. Well, let me tell you, that’s basically the transcript of my conversation with a Circuit City employee when I bought my second to last television. I got exactly what I wanted, and all I had to do was ask. The conversation, as it stands, gave ‘Mike’ the incentive he needed to help me out, just by me being polite and hopefully making his day go by just a bit quicker. No magic tricks, lying, or even slightly deceptive practices necessary.
Negotiating, one tweet at a time
Living in South East Asia while I was in high school dramatically impacted my relationship with money. Everything (and I mean everything) was negotiable, all you had to do was ask. I got very used to negotiating the price for everything from DVDs to computers, and was in the habit of doing it – it just seemed natural to me.
When I moved back to the US, some people were shocked that I would ask for discounts on products. While I don’t do it all the time anymore, if I’m going to make a major purchase at a brick-and-mortar retail outlet, I always go for it. You’d be surprised how successful I’ve been at it (I got $200 off the price of a cell phone a few years ago just by asking politely), and this is a topic I plan to discuss quite a bit more as time goes on, but I thought today I would share some of my tweets on the subject with everyone.
- 99.99% of people who don’t ask for a discount don’t get one (the pizza guy gave me one once for waiting an extra 5 minutes without me asking)
- And the most important thing you need to do to get a discount on just about anything – ask, you’ll be surprised how often people say yes
- Dress the part – you want the salesperson to take you seriously, but not to think of you as their golden egg
- Don’t forget to stand up straight and smile – salespeople are more likely to give you a discount if you act look and act the part
- Talk to someone with pricing power (if you get shot down early for a discount, ask to speak with the manager)
- When buying more than one big-ticket item (maybe an HDTV, a blu-ray player, and some speakers), ask to bundle them for a discount
- Knowing what you want and how much you’re willing to pay for something is more important to getting a discount than you think
- Sometimes, the best way to get a discount on something is to walk away – if they really want the sale the salesperson will chase you
- The best time to ask for a discount is about 2 hours before closing at the end of the month because sales people have to boost their quotas
- There is no such thing as a fixed price (you can even negotiate at big box stores like Best Buy)
- When all else fails and you want a bigger discount on something, offer cash. Just make sure you have enough in your pocket.
- Offer cash only as a last resort, because using that rewards card can get you an extra 1% to 3% cash back
- Find an interesting way to ask for help, and whomever you are asking will probably try to find an interesting way to fix your problem
- If they can’t offer you a discount, ask them if they have a coupon you can use on your purchase (remember, interesting ways…)
- Even if your negotiations aren’t fruitful, always give thanks – you don’t want to burn that bridge in case they can help you in the future
I think the key thing to remember in all this is to NOT HAGGLE EVER. I’m not telling you to argue with a retailer about the price of something (that doesn’t mean you have to take no for an answer…), or lie to them and say you ‘can’t afford it’. If they can’t match whatever price it is you want to pay, thank them and walk away – don’t ruin someone’s day over it. This is simply taking back some pricing power from the retailer of whatever product you are trying to buy, and doing it in a way that is respectful of their time and effort. “Haggling” has a bad connotation because of that kind of bad behavior. This is a business transaction – treat it as such.
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So, you want to know what's up with the brackets in the name? "Curly brackets (also called braces, or "squiggly brackets") are sometimes used in prose to indicate a series of equal choices" and "Square brackets are mainly used to enclose explanatory or missing material usually added by someone other than the original author, especially in quoted text." So basically, if you really want to be wealthy in life, you have to figure out how to get happy. Since that whole spiel would make a crappy name for a blog, I decided to do something a bit creative with some brackets.
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