Well, looks like as much as DirecTV claims to want us back (yes, I had DirecTV, so pay close attention with that in mind) they really don’t.  Installer comes out, we point to the DirecTV dish that is already on the roof.  He tells us they don’t do roofs.  Or ladders.  Tells us to call DirecTV back and ask for an independent contractor.  So we do.  He walks around the yard waving his signal detector and announces we can’t get signal on the ground (yes, that’s why the DISH WE HAVE is on the side of the house).  They don’t go on roofs, they need to put a pole in the yard.  In a historic district.  Uh, nope.

 

I get home and call DirecTV to discover the installer has cancelled my account.  Nuff said.  Still cancelling cable at the end of the month – interesting that, in this economy, Time Warner doesn’t care enough about their customers to give them the rate that service swappers get and DirecTV only wants to install on poles and apartment balconies.  Maybe it’s time to get some rabbit ears…

Wow, cell phone plans, no matter the type, make the tax code look simple.   So, what’s important in looking at cell phone plans – quality of service, calling patterns and number of phones.  Currently, we have about the best plan we can get on a monthly with rollover and three phones, but it’s costing us $75/mo and we never use the (550) shared minutes.  And a lot of our calls could really be made from a land line.  So, currently we spend $900/yr. and use about 2400 minutes per year among the three of us.  We looked at a lot of different plans – none of the monthly plans helped us out at all.  We had pamphlets and brochures everywhere, sorting through the various plans as well as checking cellular comparison sites on the web.  I personally recommend www.myrateplan.com for comparing prepay and pay-as-you-go options and www.point.com for shared monthly plans. 

 

Alltel, GoPhone (AT&T), TracFone, Net10, Virgin – we sifted and sorted and Net10 came up looking pretty good at $15/mo, especially when you add in the phones running about $30 each (lowest price flip phone – one of our requirements).  Initial cost – $90 for 300 minutes per phone for 60 days or $45/mo with the phones included.  Texting is a nickel per text, making it cheaper than calling for information only messages like "Practice has been moved to the other field and is ending at 8:30 tonight" (the heir will be thrilled).  There were plans that looked like they would be cheaper, but we didn’t want to be worrying about call days plus call times plus service dates plus and so on and so forth.  Net10 pretty much boils down to a dime a minute and a nickel per text.  The minutes expire yes, and are higher than we supposedly use now, but without a mobile to mobile, that seems like a reasonable safety net.

 

I should also mention an expense this time around – we purchased a new phone and answering machine system for home since a land line was one of our requirements for dropping monthly cell service.  Checking Best Buy first we found a nice set of AT&T phones, 3 cordless handsets and base stations for $130.  Looked good until we found the identical (down to the model number) set at Target for $90.  This was an intended purchase; while the old phone and answering machine worked fine, the cordless battery was past redemption and we couldn’t find a replacement.

 

Yes, there was a change of plans for the March Cheapskate Change when TWC gave me a kissoff on a lower priced package since I was already a prisoner… um… customer.  Time Warner Cable – they love you as a new customer, hate you as a customer and harass you forever when you leave.  I should know that, when I called them about cancelling, they had a ton of offers and reasons and low cost choices for me.  That said, we’re outta here.  Just the facts, ma’am:

 

Time Warner Package – $100/mo.

Direct TV Package – $35/mo.

Dish – (Windstream Service)

 

Direct TV includes 2 boxes and remotes wired to two locations and free DVR (no HD required until the current TV dies).  We’ve had Direct TV before so dish location isn’t an issue and the only reason we left before was Time Warner was offering a "come with us and we’ll completely screw you the minute the deal ends" package.  I call, I get a very helpful gentleman named Leon who not only walks  me through everything, but calls back later in the day to confirm the details.  The installer will be here on a specific day in a four hour window – last TWC "appointment" I got was "We’ll be there Wednesday" which got "rescheduled" at the last minute (meaning 3 PM on Wed) to "sometime on Thursday".  Did I mention that Direct TV is installing on a Saturday? 

 

For those of you wondering why Dish wasn’t an option – Windstream is the Dish provider in the area and our DSL service has gone to hell since they bought out our local phone company/DSL provider.  Not a chance we even considered giving them more money.  Your local provider of Dish may be different, so don’t toss them out of hand.

 

How we selected – the heir had a budgeting section in one of his Boy Scout badges where he was supposed to evaluate and budget for a major purchase.  We put a bit of a twist on that and had him analyze the various services.  The first thing he did was ask each of us for our favorite "can’t live without" TV shows (in my case that was Bones, Psych and The Closer), he then made a list of the corresponding channels and comparable packages.  He then charted the costs and features of the packages (which are almost identical), penalties, contract requirements and such and the end result was Direct TV beating the living crap out of TWC.

 

Nope, we aren’t going to quit eating out entirely,  but we are going to manage it.  Months and months ago we decided to go out one Thursday as a family activity before the heir went to the starter husband’s house for the weekend.  It was a great idea and has turned into a weekly habit.  No, it didn’t increase our eating out budget, it actually reduced it because no one was asking about eating out the rest of the week and we dropped all fast food about the same time.   On average, this activity costs us about $50 per week, $200 per month.  We had several options here – to cut out eating out partially or entirely, change restaurants, turn it into a family cooking night, or trying a different activity. 

 

By consolidating all our eating out into one regular weekly “fixed” amount, we already reduced our dining budget substantially, so we decided we could keep this in a modified state for the moment, knowing that we could quickly save more money down the road.  We didn’t want to change restaurants either as we really like and appreciate the staff.  As an aside, they collect the marginally used crayons that kids leave behind and we take and donate them to schools, teachers, day cares, churches, etc.  We decided to cut one Thursday a month out for the moment on the week that the heir was not going to visit his dad and to make that Thursday a family cook and board game night.