Doing an annual audit of your debit-card statements can save you money

A few years ago I lost my ATM card while on holiday. While it was highly inconvenient at the time, it later made me realise that I could actually end up better off financially by doing it.

How? Well, it is not until you have to cancel a debit card do you realise the full gamut of all the direct debits, subscriptions and other hidden household bills that see cash regularly disappearing from your bank account automatically.

These days, a large amount of our data is stored in the cloud.Credit: iStock

As one wise person once told me: “The problem with a direct debit is, it’s like they’ve got a hand in your pocket”. So, it is a good idea to remove these hands from your pockets by doing an annual audit of your debit-card statements.

Take subscriptions, for example. The average home has 4.3 entertainment subscriptions, made up of TV/movie, gaming and music services, according to the 2021 Telsyte Digital Consumer Study.

However, how many of us really know exactly what we are paying for?

In many cases, it is possible to save money by “turning off” some of these accounts for a period of time while they are unused, then switching them back on when desired.

For example, this is particularly the case if you like football, but don’t really watch a sports subscription service for the rest of the year. It works the same way with individual shows on digital streaming services.

I found I was paying for an audiobook app I had not used in months, so quickly switched it off.

Many other subscriptions are even harder to keep track of, such as cloud storage plans.

I get so many of those little invoice emails from Apple that I stopped reading them years ago.

In the age of huge digital photo albums, how many people are paying Apple or Google for extra storage space for their pictures and device back-ups? The tech giants won’t say.

However, the Telsyte study found 44 per cent of device users utilised cloud storage services for their digital data. Of those, more than 30 per cent paid for the privilege.

These storage plans are the product upsells of the technology universe.

Apple gives you 5GB of free storage, but that does not take long to fill before you are offered extra space – for a charge. Same deal with Google, which has its free cloud storage space capped at 15GB.

Cloud storage plans also have become more feature-packed over time, resulting in price increases. The more expensive types can add up to as much as $120 a year for a family plan.

I found I was paying for both Apple and Google photo storage, which was a waste of cash.

The other hidden bill that becomes clear if you go one step further and do an audit on your credit-card statements is the amount of interest you are paying.

Almost half of credit-card customers pay interest because they do not pay off the outstanding balance in full each month.

With the average credit-card balance now at $2877 and an average interest rate of 17 per cent, that is about $430 in interest a year if you are only paying the minimum amount.

To put that in perspective, the average electricity bill is about $1500 a year, so many people have a credit-card interest bill that is almost one-third of their annual power bill.

However, debit cards remain far more popular than credit cards. That is good because they do almost everything a credit card does without racking up an interest bill.

Doing an annual audit on your debit-card statements is a bit like moving house. It forces you to look at every item and ask yourself “do I really need this”?

These little purges are good for your bank balance, so why not do a “Marie Kondo” on your debit card at least once a year?

• Advice given in this article is general in nature and is not intended to influence readers’ decisions about investing or financial products. They should always seek their own professional advice that takes into account their own personal circumstances before making any financial decisions.

Joel Gibson is the author of KILL BILLS. Catch his money saving segments on Nine Radio, Today and on Twitter @joelgibson.